


Torchwood et la Bête

by Wynkat



Category: La Belle et la Bête | Beauty and the Beast, Torchwood
Genre: Action/Adventure, Beauty and the Beast, Community: reel_torchwood, Fairy Tales, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-11
Updated: 2010-01-11
Packaged: 2017-10-06 04:50:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 52,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/49837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wynkat/pseuds/Wynkat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the team is invited to France to assist in a UNIT investigation of unusual Rift Activity, they go with dreams of a quick mission and a chance for a little R & R. Instead they find a wall of roses, an alien, and a mystery. Really, you'd think they would know better by now, they are Torchwood after all, and *nothing* in their world is ever simple.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part One - The Rose

**Author's Note:**

> While there are technically 27 chapters and an epilogue, divided across five parts, I have chosen to posting this as only five parts because that actually fits the flow of the story better.
> 
> Disclaimer: "Torchwood" and its characters belong to RTD and the BBC. "La Belle et la Bête" and its characters belong to JC and Lopert Pictures. This is a work of fun and fiction, no infringement is implied or intended.
> 
> Author's Notes: Strangely enough I got this plot bunny the night before Reel_Torchwood was announced which meant of course that I simply could not pass up the opportunity to run with it. Had I know then that it was going to be a Vorpal Bunny, I might have run screaming back to Cardiff with the gang, but things seemed to have work out all right in the end.
> 
> Beta'd by the amazing and incredibly patient and geeky [info]temporal_witch , bless you hun!
> 
> If you have never seen Cocteau's "La Belle et la Bête", it is worth sitting through the black and white and subtitles because it is simply beautiful and it is the movie that gave Disney so very many ideas for their film.

Part One - The Rose

Chapter One

_Children believe what we tell them. They have complete faith in us. They believe that a rose plucked from a garden can bring drama to a family. They believe that the hands of a beast will smoke when he kills a victim, and that this beast will be shamed when confronted by compassion. They believe in a thousand other simple things. I ask of you a little of this childlike simplicity, and to bring us luck let me speak four truly magic words, childhood's Open Sesame:_

Once upon a time...

Our story begins not so very long ago and not so very far away. Amongst the soft green hills of the Isle valley in Boudreaux, France, lies the ancient town of Perigueux. It was a town loved by the Gauls and the Romans for its fertility and proximity to the ocean. Crusaders called it home after their victories and their defeats, while Renaissance painters and sculptors walked its streets dreaming in conte. So many have found refuge and pleasure here that even aliens from other worlds come to Perigueux looking for safety out of the stars.

In the twilight of a spring evening a team of heroes are doing what they do best, tracking signs of alien life and that strange energy known as Rift Activity. The Captain of this intrepid crew, Jack Harkness, with Toshiko Sato, their brilliant scientist, by his side, are driving through the twilight led by a lilting Welsh voice and the rolling Rs of a nearly-native French speaker. The Welsh belongs to the team's youngest member and organizer extraordinaire, Ianto Jones, and the French to the team's contact in Perigueux, UNIT Special Services Agent Avenant desEtranger.

"Ok, now where?" Jack asked.

As they sped along the road out of town, they were passed by a handful of cars heading into town for the evening. With the last warm fingers of sunlight slipping away below the horizon, Jack flipped on the headlight of their borrowed SUV.

"Take your next turn," Avenant said over the comm system, the waves of his accent making every word sound like an impressionist painting in the darkness. "- Rue des Menestriers du Perigord. It should turn into a dirt road after about 1500 meters. The signal is somewhere along the dirt road."

"Got it. Rue des Menestriers du Perigord. Dirt road. Alien signal." Jack turned and flashed a smile to Tosh "At least the scenery is nice."

Tosh looked over at Jack and grinned back. "It's so different from Cardiff."

"I thought you liked Cardiff!"

"I do, but you know, it's nice to see other places once in a while." Tosh pointed to a street sign gleaming in the car's headlights. "There's the turnoff."

"Got it." Jack slowed the car and made the turn onto the new road. Tosh looked down at the scanner in her hands.

"Anything?"

Tosh shook her head. "Nothing new."

Suburbs gave way to country as the road left the hubbub of city life behind. The trees grew larger, weaving branches overhead to create a tunnel of quiet solitude. The only light came from the beams of the SUV's headlights carving through the night before them.

The road under them shifted and Jack felt the change through the vehicle's tires. "We have dirt road."

"Good," Ianto said over the comm. "The signal is not far from your location."

"Or not." Tosh pointed out the front window of the vehicle. A wall of plant life loomed up out of the darkness, crossing the road in front of them. "It's a dead end." Tosh said.

Jack hit the brakes. "Damn."

"Can't be," Ianto said. "According to the map the road goes on for at least another 1000 meters."

"Not this way it doesn't." Jack looked through the side window at the area around them. The whole road was filled by a wall of foliage nearly fifteen feet high. "It's all overgrown. No way around it."

"There must be some mistake," Avenant growled in their ears.

"At least it's pretty mistake," Tosh said.

"A wall of roses," Jack added.

"Well, you did say you were going to bring me a dozen roses, sir," Ianto quipped.

"When did I say that?"

Ianto coughed discreetly.

"Oh," Jack said, a flash of memory warming his whole body. "Right."

"I will find the local ordinance maps. Perhaps the city planners created a re-route that has yet to make on to the national maps," Avenant said.

"Good. Tosh and I'll see if we can't find a way through the roses, and pick Ianto some while I'm here. Which would you prefer, red or pink?"

"Ah… Perhaps you should wait on the picking until we are certain that they are not the source of the Rift energy?"

"Good point."

Jack tapped off his com as he got out of the car and settled his greatcoat more comfortably across his shoulders. With the darkness, the temperature was dropping. Tosh joined him, buttoning up the front of her burgundy leather coat and pulling her scanner from the depths of a pocket. Together they approached the wall.

Scattered among the rich green leaves and wicked looking thorns were deep pink roses with shadow-black centers. In the growing darkness the colors were so dark that the flowers looked like someone had dipped each of them in blood and let them dry overnight.

"Apple," Tosh said with a wistful smile.

Jack nodded realizing she was right. The smell was spicy and rich, but under it all was a hint of apples. "Good nose."

Jack leaned in to a cluster of roses at shoulder height, drawn by the powerful scent and colors.

"Jack, no!"

"What?"

"What if they're… toxic or something?" Tosh shrugged.

"Relax, they're just roses." Jack nudged the center of the closest rose with his nose, closed his eyes, and inhaled deeply. "Mmmm."

"I thought you didn't like roses?"

"What?" Jack looked at her in surprise and then realized what she meant. "No. Well, not fairy roses. Normal ones I like just fine."

"Oh. So are you going to bring some back for Ianto?"

"Maybe." Jack grinned.

They walked along the wall looking for any sign of break or change. Jack pushed a branch out of Tosh's way and saw her smile, her eyes gone distant with some memory.  
"So… how was dinner?"

"What?" Tosh asked, a blush creeping along her cheeks. Jack's grin grew wider. So he was right about where her thoughts had taken her. Good to know.

"Dinner? With our cute new UNIT boy, Avenant?"

"Jack! He'll hear you."

"Please! I put the comms on mute as soon as we got out of the car."

"Oh."

Tosh looked down at her scanner. "Rift energy is definitely coming from the other side of this wall, Jack. The signature is identical to the one UNIT has been monitoring for the last three weeks."

"Can you find us a way in?"

"Searching now."

"Did he take you somewhere nice?"

Tosh looked up quickly then back to her scanner with a smile. "Yes. It was a little bistro along the river that friends of his have run for years. It was really very sweet."

"And?"

She shrugged, but the smile stayed in her eyes. "It was nice."

"You like him, don't you?"

"I barely know him."

"You know him better than the rest of us do."

"Please!" Tosh fussed with the scarf at her neck, tugging sharply on one end. Jack wondered what she was really twisting with those slender fingers. Then she tossed the tasseled end over her shoulder and walked past him. "Email is hardly a way to get to know someone."

"Seems to be what all the cool kids are doing these days." Jack grinned. "Besides, it was your contact with him that got us invited to this little shindig. That counts for a lot in my book."

"Well… "

Jack caught up with Tosh and pulled on her arm to get her to look at him. "Enjoy yourself, Tosh. You deserve it."

Tosh smiled. "Thank you."

"And if he hurts you, I'll lock him in the lowest level of the morgue for the rest of eternity."

"Jack!!"

"Kidding!" Jack held up his hands in mock surrender.

Tosh's smile expanded and she laughed along with Jack.

They walked for a while in companionable silence, Tosh keeping her eyes on her scanner and Jack being the eyes for both of them in the physical world. He tugged her to one side, out of range of a low-hanging branch, and used the back of his long coat to push a particularly thorny patch of rose bush out of their way.

"There's a shift in the energy pattern a few meters this way." Tosh indicated along the wall of roses. They walked forward to a nearly hidden gate.

"That's my Tosh!" Jack taped his comm again. "Ianto, Avenant, we've found a gate through the rose wall. Tosh's readings indicate that the Rift energy is coming from the other side."

"Agreed," Ianto replied on the other end of the line. "Whatever came through the Rift landed about 800 meters from where you are standing. Do you want me to have Gwen and Owen meet you there?"

"No. Let them finish up in town. Tosh and I will do an initial scan, see what we can find and then meet you all back at the UNIT base."

"Very good, sir."

Jack turned back to watch Tosh massage her scanning program. Her skill and joy with electronics never ceased to delight him, and the fact that she put all that skill to use for Torchwood was like the sweetest frosting on the best cake. Jack grinned. Apparently France was making him as giddy and romantic as it was his team. Gwen had sworn that she wasn't leaving until she found the perfect gift to bring back to share with Rhys and even Owen had mumbled something about wanting to explore the local color. And he hadn't even sneered! Maybe they did need to take vacations more often.

A faint green glow pulled Jack's attention to the gate in front of them, lines of green light shimmering faintly across its surface. He looked back down over Tosh's shoulder and watched her intently tapping numbers and letters into the machine.

"Got it!" Tosh declared, and a moment later a brilliant flash of emerald green light filled the night starting at the center of the gate and spreading out along the length of rose wall. Jack threw up an arm to shield his eyes and noticed Tosh doing the same.

When the glow behind his eyelids faded, Jack opened his eyes. The gate was fully outlined in emerald green light.

"Jack, the gate's opening!"

As they watched, the gate swung silently outward. The light lines on the gate and along the wall faded, but didn't go out completely.

"Well…" Jack said.

"Yeah," Tosh agreed with a nervous giggle.

Jack stepped forward, drawing his Webley. He heard the soft slide of Tosh's gun coming out of its holster. He looked over as she stepped up beside him, gun in one hand, scanner in the other.

"Ready?"

Tosh nodded.

They stepped through the gate together and crossed into a completely different land.

Where the world outside the wall had been overgrown and nearly impassable, inside the wall was beautiful and nearly contained. Outside the wall, humanity had no say in the direction or choices that nature took. Inside, nature and humanity seemed to have found a balance. Here was a place of ordered beauty interwoven with controlled chaos.

"Oh!" Tosh said as she stepped on to a cobblestone pathway wide enough for ten large men.

The path was lined with trees that were taller than the wall of roses they had just passed, yet they had not seen them from the road. Jack reached a hand out to one thick gray trunk and looked up as far as his neck would tolerate and still couldn't see the where the canopy touched the sky.

Someone had taken pains to plant alternating ash and maples along what must have once served as a drive of some sort. Jack imagined that it would have been an impressive sight to see the silver bark of the ash trees interweaving with the darker brown of the maples, each tree heavy with bright green leaves. Now it was a different, wilder kind of beauty, as several varieties of oak, and even a few willows, competed with the ashes and maples for space along the road.

"There are no weeds in the stones," Tosh whispered.

Jack looked back over his shoulder at her. "Hm?"

"No weeds." She pointed to the stone at her feet that was dusty but uniformly gray in color. "Some of those trees have to be at least half a century old, Jack. There's no other way they could be that tall or that wide around. With that much growth, there should be weeds along this path. Actually, there shouldn't really be a road left at all."

Jack nodded and kept walking.

A quarter of a mile or more past the gate, Jack stopped and waited for Tosh to catch up with him. When she did, her face broke into a huge grin as she looked from the scene before her to Jack.

"Is that what I think it is?"

Just visible ahead of them, between the trees at the end of the drive was a large stone building with four circular turrets connected by a series of long crenellated walls.

"Yup." Jack tapped his ear piece. "Avenant… are you folks missing a castle?"

"A what?" Static hissed along the line.

"Large building. Stone fortifications, crenellations along the top of the walls. Couple of big towers at each corner."

"Do you mean a château?" Avenant asked.

"Castle, chateau, what's the difference?" Jack asked.

"French," Avenant said.

"Right." Jack rolled his eyes and smiled. Tosh grinned and turned back to the view of the castle. "Well, are you missing either one?

"Ah… yes, actually." Avenant's voice was lost in a burst of static. "A medieval château disappeared from this area about 500 years ago." Avenant paused. "Are you saying you found it?"

"Yeah."

"It's beautiful," Tosh said just as her scanner pinged. "Jack! I'm getting multiple energy readings. Several from inside the castle and more from the somewhere on the left side of building off in the grounds."

"Okay, we split up. I'll take the outside area, you check inside. Nothing fancy, though; just a quick in and out to check what's there."

Tosh nodded.

"Ianto, see if you can localize the readings, get us a better idea of what we are looking for."

"I'm on it."

 

Leaving Tosh to explore the inside of the castle, Jack headed around to the left, hugging the castle wall in the dark. He followed the curve of a turret crawling with ivy, and then continued past a side wall to a wide patio lined with fragrant orange trees. A broad set of steps led from the patio to a D-shaped pool and a second trellised patio heavy with wisteria that glowed like clusters of purple stars against its night-dark foliage.

Double checking the readings on his vortex manipulator, Jack ducked under a thick vine of wisteria and walked into the heart of the poolside patio. Long thin leaves crunched underfoot and a thick scent filled the air around him. He closed his eyes, drank in the fragrance and remembered Estelle's gardens.

No matter where they lived, Estelle managed to plant something somewhere. First in pots in the tiny flat they had shared before the war, and later in larger and larger bits of land as time and circumstances allowed. She would plant odd splashes of color in every direction and in any spot, no matter how unlikely. And the smells! Wisterias had been her favorite; she loved that such an explosion of color and scent could come from such a small flower, but there were always a half dozen or so antique roses scattered among the herbs and vegetables. No trumped up "modern" hybrids that didn't know how to produce a proper scent for her. Jack smiled, remembering Estelle brandishing a gardening catalogue at him in a rare moment of temper. Don't they understand what's important in roses! she had said. He'd taken her in his arms and hugged her like he used to, like his "father" used to, and kissed the top of her head. Nope, was all he said in response. She'd pushed at his arm, a punch of sorts: Oh you! But she'd laughed as she'd said it and relented. He'd sent her an Empress Josephine rose for her birthday that year. In his note he said the color reminded him of the pink in her cheeks when she laughed.

Jack bowed his head, sadness and joy mixing in his heart. Memories of Estelle always seemed to do that to him. There had not been enough time with her, and yet what time they'd had had been so filled with delight that she would be mad at him if he forgot those moments in his grief.

Resolutely opening his eyes, Jack noticed an odd shape among the bracken. He crouched to get a better look. It was a little smaller than his fist, and shaped like a child's letter block, but with softly rounded edges. It glowed faintly pink in the dim light. He tilted his head and the color shifted to deep green. When he tilted his head again, looking directly down over the cube, the glow shifted again, going so dark and colorless that it seemed to disappear into the shadows.

Jack brought his wrist up and flipped open the leather strap. He tapped a command, running a scan over the cube. When all signs pointed to the thing being harmless, he flipped the strapped closed and reached down to dislodge the cube and stood.

Under his fingers, Jack felt a raised design on one of the sides. He turned the cube over in his hands and held it up to see the image. There, glowing in the pink light that came from within the cube, was the image of a rose carved onto its surface.

"Well, what'd ya know!"

Grinning, Jack tapped the comm unit at his ear. "Hey Ianto! It seems I found you a rose after all!"

Static hissed back across the line.

"Ianto? Avenant?"

Jack tossed the cubed into the air once, his worried eyes tracking its movement. He caught the cube as it descended towards his palm, slipped it into an inside pocket of his greatcoat as he tapped the unit at his ear again.

"Tosh, can you hear me?"

Silence replaced static in his ear.

"Damn."

Jack turned toward the castle but stopped as he came face to face with the strangest creature he had seen in a long time.

Before him stood a being whose head and neck looked for all the world like a large cat, but who wore the body and clothing of a man, and had the tail of a wolf thrashing angrily at his side. The vertically slit yellow eyes stared at Jack with clear intelligence even as they hinted at wildness, while the triangular wide-set ears kept swiveling, as if testing the air at each creak of tree and cry of night bird.

The creature's head and neck were covered in silky sable fur that held a hint of lighter stripes when he moved, but over his wrists the fur appeared coarser and lighter in color, like a timber wolf. The creature's hands were large and smooth with an iridescent shimmer to them, like scales of a snake. And each tensely-clenched finger ended in a finely-tipped claw. To top the whole thing off, the beast was wearing a costume that made Jack's RAF coat look positively ahead of the curve.

He was like something out of movie about knights and maidens - regal and strong, yet no more meant for this time than Jack was. The being wore a calf-length tunic that was decorated with a thick and richly embroidered collar. Jack caught hints of gemstones among the gold chase work. There was a suggestion of finely made leather boots under the tunic. And draped over the beast's shoulders was a long black velvet cloak, held in place with a gold pin in the shape of a rose.

"You dare to steal the Rose from me?" the creature demanded, stalking towards Jack. "Of all the things in my home, the Rose is the most precious. You could have taken anything else and I would have let you pass."

"Look, mister..."

"No one calls me mister or sir! I am 'Beast' I have no other name."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean..."

"Compliments and fancy words will not save you. The penalty for such a simple theft is death." Beast howled and charged at Jack.

"Stop!" Jack yelled, or tried to, as Beast knocked him to the ground, robbing him of breath and vision.

Jack kicked out blindly and heard Beast hiss as his booted foot connected with something above him. He kicked again and missed, but managed to roll out from under Beast's weight and get to his knees. He knelt in the dark, breathing heavily.

"Listen, I'm sorry…"

Beast howled again and ran snarling towards Jack. "You will die for your actions!"

Jack scrambled sideways and back into a dense wall of wisteria vines. He tugged on the closest vine, showering them both with lavender petals and heady fragrance. Beast didn't stop. He pulled the vine out of Jack's hand with one powerful arm and reached for Jack's neck with the other.

Praying to any being that might be on his side today, Jack punched at Beast's head, connecting hard enough to see the cat-like head rock backwards. Beast shook his head and snarled. Jack brought his fist up to punch again and Beast slashed towards him with the claws of his free hand. Jack saw the strike coming and tried to shift out of the way. The blade-sharp claws sliced down, tearing long parallel gashes through his coat and deep into his shoulder and chest.

Jack let out a gasp of surprise as Beast's claws pulled out of his skin and Beast's other hand released his neck. He dropped to the ground, struggling for air and confused by the odd flavor of the pain in his chest. Ice and fire burned along the gashes, radiating out in bands of alternating waves of heat and cold. Visions of home and places he had called home passed through his thoughts, pulling him back through time. The bedroom he'd shared with Gray in the family compound on the Boeshane Peninsula. His room in the TARDIS with its big soft bed and blue and copper walls that smelled of cinnamon. His cubby of a room in the Officers Quarters at Pembroke Dock RAF base. The large easy chair in Ianto's flat. It was like nothing he had felt before. He felt stretched and pulled, his body struggling to breath in the garden while his soul swam in comfort in a dozen other places from his memory.

He looked down, saw the blood turning his shirt and vest black and knew that Ianto was going to give him hell for ruining yet more clothes. He pressed a hand to the slash nearest his shoulder and felt bone slide under his fingers. Too many bits of him were exposed. Beast was right: he was going to die to pay the debt.

Jack coughed and felt blood in his lungs. His vision fading, he sank farther down onto the ground, sitting with a heavy thud as his legs gave out. He leaned into the wisteria vine that had caused him trouble and looked up. Beast was standing in front of him watching and for just a moment Jack could have sworn he saw sadness in those inhuman eyes.

 

Chapter Two

 

Tosh watched Jack walk away around the side of the castle and took a quick centering breath. She checked her scanner, even though she already knew where she needed to go, and walked toward the massive wood and iron door that guarded the castle. Like so many things about this place, the door made Tosh feel tiny. Each of its seven wood beams must have come from a separate tree and the hammered iron pins and plates just added to the sense of weight that she felt looking at the door.

She reached a hand out to the knocker at the center of the door; it only seemed right to be polite first. She banged the iron ring against its plate three times, then waited for an answer. She laughed to herself; there wasn't going to be one, of course, because aliens never answered doors.

A sound from the other side of the door broke the silence around her. Tosh watched in surprise as the massive door opened.

"Hello?" Tosh called into the darkness. "Is anyone there?"

Sliding her gun back into her hand, Tosh stepped past the open door into the empty hallway. A candelabrum hung suspended in the air, its multitude of candles flaring into light as Tosh crossed the threshold and the door closed behind her.

She whirled around, looking for the source of the door's movement, but could see nothing and no one anywhere in the hallway with her. She checked her scanner for any signs of life in her area and found only herself.

"What is going on?" she whispered.

A second candelabrum flared to life a little way beyond the first, lighting up more of the hallway.

Tosh stepped up between the two candelabra and ran her scanner over them. The readings she was getting were very odd, similar to, but not quite the same as, the source readings that had led them to the castle in the first place. She shook her head, puzzled.

Looking more closely at the candelabra, she saw that each was actually held to the wall by a human, or at least human-looking, arm. Shoving her scanner back into a pocket, she reached one hand out to the nearest arm and gently ran a finger along its length. It felt cool, like marble, yet with the smoothness of polished metal. The arms gleamed like gold, enough so that they matched the actual candelabra they held.

Another candelabrum flared to life, this time across the hallway behind her. This was followed by a series of candelabra flaring to light all down the length of both sides of the long hallway.

Filled with light, the hallway sparkled with polished marble and gold. A rich blue carpet ran from the entryway to an arch at the end of the hall where two more large candelabra stood blazing with even more candles.

Tosh shook her head in wonder. She had never in her wildest dreams imagined being in a place like this, and yet here she was. It felt almost too amazing to take in.

Movement along the walls pulled Tosh's attention back to the reality of the moment. She turned to watch the arm nearest her release its candelabrum, which hung motionless in the air, unsupported by any means Tosh could see. The arm then pointed away from the door and down along the hallway towards the archway. Tosh turned and saw that the arm on the opposite side of the hall had done the same thing and its candelabrum was also hanging in the air of its own accord, while it pointed down the hall.

"I take it you want me to go that way?"

The arms didn't move. Nothing answered her, though at this point Tosh would not have been surprised if a talking clock appeared to lead her to dinner or some bizarre cabaret show.

"Ok. I get. I'll see what's in the next room," Tosh said, as much to hear herself, to hear any voice in the strangeness of this castle, as to let the odd creatures know that she had gotten their message.

On the other side of the arch was an echoing chamber with two enormous fireplaces, one on each end of the room. At one end a table had been set with linens in the same blue and gold from the hallway. Plates, silverware, and crystal glasses were set out for two diners. And platters of food filled every inch of the table. Two massive carved chairs were pushed up against the table, waiting for their occupants.

More arm-wielding candelabra sprouted from the wall near the table and two even odder ones whose arms and legs were carved with fur and claws and bits that were probably never from an earthly animal stood lighting the table opposite the fireplace.

Amazing carvings of human and animal heads gazed out at her from either side of fireplace's mantle, their eyes seeming to follow her as she wandered the room looking at various items. It was a disturbing feeling and Tosh noticed that she kept looking over at the carvings, watching for the movement of the eyes. She never saw them move, but she did mark which ones changed position the most - the feline ones - and which ones changed the least - the serpents. She didn't know what it meant, so she stored the information away for later.

Tosh took her scanner back out to test the food on the table. As she reached for one of the glasses, a hand let go of its candelabrum and picked up a pitcher from the table, poured a deep red wine into the glass she had been about to take, then offered her the glass.

"Um, thank you…?"

She sniffed at the wine. It smelled normal. She held the scanner over the top of the glass and checked the readings. Water, Ethyl Alcohol, Tannins, Acids, Polyphenols… all normal indicators for wine. But there was that odd extra signature that was almost, but not quite the same, as the Rift spike energy that had brought them to France. It was almost as though whatever was here in the castle was seeping into the wine.

She handed the glass back to the outstretched arm at the center of the table and tapped her ear piece. She had enough data to start passing some of it on to Jack. Once she did that, she could check on the signal she was getting from the upper level.

"Jack?" Static hissed across the line. "Jack, can you hear me?"

Tosh looked around the room, searching for a door that led to the side gardens. She found one that looked promising and started towards it, tapping her ear piece a second time as she went.

"Ianto? Avenant? Can anyone hear me?"

Silence was her only answer.

Following what must have been a servant's hallway, from the lack of elegant carpets and drapes, Tosh managed to find the kitchen and finally a door to the outside. She pulled up her scanner and checked the area for any sign of Jack. She'd warned him the comm units could be unreliable, but he didn't believe her. Still, he'd given her free reign with the tech for the team, so they all had locators in their phones which she could use even if the system was being blocked somehow.

She found Jack's signal coming from area only a few meters from where she was.

"Damn…"

There was something with him. One of the alien signatures they had been looking for was directly on top of Jack's signal. She turned towards Jack and started to run.

Tosh skidded to a halt in a burst of dried leaves and fallen wisteria blossoms. She had a fleeting thought that it would have been a lovely entrance except that her Captain was on the ground, clearly in pain and there was a creature in medieval garb pawing through Jack's pockets.

Tosh raised her gun and stepped forward. "Leave him alone."

The creature turned and Tosh gasped, amazed. Its deep black fur glowed faintly in the first light of the moon. Its yellow eyes widened when it saw her and its tail whipped madly behind its back. It looked like something out of a dream or a fantasy and nothing like any alien Tosh had ever seen, or even anything Jack had ever teased them with.

"He does not die!" the creature snarled, and Tosh looked down at Jack in horror.

Tosh took a step toward Jack, and then made herself stop. She didn't know enough to get close to the alien yet. "What have you done!?"

"He stole from me, and for that he must die, yet he does not die!"

The alien looked from Tosh back down to Jack, who lay, with his eyes closed, twisted around on himself, as though he were trying to protect his body. Tosh could see dark stains on the shoulder of Jack's coat but no other signs of what had happened.

"Whatever he did, whatever he took, it would have been for a good reason," she tried to explain.

The creature whipped around, its cloak flying out behind him as it moved. "There can be no reason for what he has done. Take him away and be gone!"

"I can't. Our car… our vehicle is outside the walls. He can't walk; I'll need to call for help."

"No! There will be no more of your kind in my home." It reached into a pouch at its waist and pulled something out. Tosh could only see a violet glow coming through its clenched fingers. "Come here."

When Tosh did not move, the creature growled. "Come here. I will send you both away."

"You tried to kill him."

"Have you stolen from me?"

"No."

"Then I will not have to kill you as well. Come here and I will take you outside the walls."

Reluctantly Tosh holstered her gun and walked towards the creature.

"Touch his hand and mine at the same time," it instructed.

"Why?"

It growled its impatience. "Touch his hand." The creature pointed at Jack's hand where it lay against a wilting pile of wisteria petals.

Tosh crouched down and gently picked up Jack's hand. It was cold to her touch, something Jack never was, at least not since Abaddon, and wet with blood. She looked up at the creature and nodded. It reached a scaled hand down to her. She took a deep breath and placed her hand, and both their lives, in its.

The creature raised its other hand and the violet light expanded to fill the little covered patio, then everything was blackness and water.

Tosh was gliding through a warm ocean, floating along the tributary of a tropical delta and swept up in the tides of superheated emotions. Tears pressed against her eyes and grief engulfed her heart. She wanted to scream or weep or just be held until the universe ended. All she could do was hold on to the hands in hers, one burning with cold, the other burning with fire, and pray that they would surface.

The water receded. She felt cool earth under her knees and opened her eyes. They were outside the walls of the castle, a few feet from the SUV. She let go of Jack's hand to dig her fingers into the leaf-strewn ground. They really were outside the walls. Tosh opened her mouth in a silent cry of wonder and then stopped as she caught sight of the creature. It was weeping.

"Are you alright?"

It pulled its arm out of Tosh's hand and stepped away. "Go. Take him to die and leave me in peace. All of you, just leave me in peace!"

The creature raised the hand that held the violet glow, turned its back to Tosh, and vanished in a burst of light.

Tosh sighed and looked down at her hands. She opened the one that had held the creature's arm. Inside were bits of coarse gray fur and iridescent scales. She poked at the blood-slick mass for a moment, letting her mind turn over the elements and visualize entries in the Hub's database. Satisfied that she had enough visual evidence to at least start her thoughts on that task, she pulled a small bag out of her pocket, carefully tucked the material inside, sealed it, and placed it back in her pocket to give to Owen for his examination later.

Next she turned her attention to Jack. He was unconscious, but alive, which made no sense. Looking at his wounds, she would have expected him to have died and revived by now, but he hadn't. He was shivering with cold and sweating at the same time. She knew something was very wrong. She tugged his coat back on the wounded side so she could try to staunch the blood. She pulled off her scarf and wrapped it as tightly as she could around his chest and tied it off over his shoulder. Then she pulled his coat back up to keep him warm.

The comm unit in her ear crackled to life. "Jack! Tosh! Can you hear me?!"

"Ianto! Thank god! Yes! I can hear you, but Jack's been injured. I'm just getting him into the SUV now," she said, struggling to lift Jack and drag him to the passenger side door.

"What happened?"

"We found the energy signal. It's alien, all right," she said, digging the keys out of Jack's pants pocket and unlocking the car with a click of the fob.

"Jack?"

"The alien attacked him," she said after taking a moment to get Jack mostly to his feet and then into the seat. "He's bleeding. I've got it mostly stopped. I don't know how bad it is. But Ianto, something's not right. He's not awake. He's not talking at all. He's not dead, but he's not exactly alive either."

"How is that possible?"

She shook her head, looking at Jack. "I don't know. Just… just make sure Owen is there by the time we are, yeah?"

"Yeah. Will do. Thanks, Tosh."

"I'm on my way back to base now." She adjusted Jack in his seat and reached over to slide the seat belt home, then walked around to the driver's side and climbed in.

Tosh touched Jack's clammy check. "You just hang in there Jack, okay? I'll get you to Owen, but you hang in there for me? Please?"

 

Chapter Three

 

_Across town, the two final members of the intrepid searchers of alien artifacts and Rift energy, former Police Constable Gwen Cooper and Doctor Owen Harper, are exploring the strange findings around an ancient ruin, the Vesunna Musée Gallo-Romain. The two have found little to answer the questions that brought their team to France, but the sun has only just lost its battle with night, its final rays reflected in the museum's glass walls and painting the Roman stones in gold and orange light. As their teammates discovered, ancient ruins in this part of France rarely give the answers one expects, but they do give answers, if you know where to look._

 

"Getting anything?" Gwen asked, tugging her jacket closed. The inside of the museum was chilly, especially now that the sun was going down and had less power to warm her through all the glass around them. For some reason she had thought France would be warm all the time. Pure fancy, she supposed.

"Nothing," Owen said, looking up from his scanner. "You'd think that a place this old would hold on to Rift energy better than this."

"Well, Tosh did say it was a long shot."

"More like goose chase."

Gwen pointed to a section of the museum that displayed a collection of Roman glass and stoneware found at the dig site. "Let's try over there; might be the signal is coming from one of the pots in the case."

"Fine."

"UNIT said something about getting energy signatures from this area during the first week."

"I said, fine." Owen walked away grumbling in the direction of the pot shards.

"I'm just trying to be clear."

"Yeah, clear as mud."

"What's with you? You were all fine and happy this afternoon, and now you're broody as day old milk."

"It's nothing."

Gwen pulled on Owen's sleeve, forcing him to stop and look at her. "Don't give me that, Owen. I've worked with you long enough to know there's more going on with you than 'nothing'."

Owen looked down at the grated walkway and kicked an invisible rock. "I just… "

"What?"

"I just always imagined bringing Katie here, you know."

"To the museum?"

Owen shook his head. "To France. She never wanted to do the whole Caribbean cruise thing for our honeymoon. The practical one, if you can imagine, my Katie. Just a week alone in a chateau together with nothing to do but drink wine, make love and watch the sun rise."

Gwen gripped Owen's arm. He had mentioned his fiancée Katie to her only once, nearly a year ago. They had been lying in bed together, just holding each other of all the odd things for them to do, not trying to screw each other's brains out for once. He'd whispered Katie's name and told Gwen how she had died and he'd nearly gone mad with loss and grief. And then he'd never mentioned her again. Gwen had known somehow that it was a precious secret and so she never brought Katie up either.

"Yet here you are," she said quietly.

"Here I am. With you."

Gwen flinched. Raw pain blazed in Owen's eyes for one heartbreaking moment and then was gone.

"Right. Nothing to be done but make the most of it. Care for a fuck? Or shall we just find this alien artifact and get back to UNIT for show and tell with Daddy?"

Gwen pulled away, stunned and burned once again by Owen's quicksilver shift of moods. She should know better than to fall into his sorrow; he always slammed the doors closed as soon as he realized they were open.

"Artifact," she answered gamely. "I'll save my fucking for Rhys, if you don't mind."

"Your loss, sweetheart. Oh, but then you knew that," Owen said, turning away and walking rapidly towards the table of glass and ceramic pots.

Gwen clenched her teeth and followed after him. When she reached the display table, Owen was already running the scanner over the objects and checking readings.

Gwen leaned in to whisper to him. "You can be a right bastard, you know that?"

"Part of my charm," he responded with a crooked grin.

Gwen started to say something else, but then hit him on the shoulder and hissed at him to put away the scanner when she saw a woman in a very fashionable cream business suit and Museum name tag walk towards them.

"The museum will be closing in a few minutes. I'm afraid I will have to ask you to make your way toward the exit."

She waved a manicured hand towards the glass-paneled front of the museum.

Gwen pulled out her wallet and opened it, showing both her Torchwood and her temporary UNIT IDs in one go. She sent Ianto a silent prayer for talking Jack into letting them carry both IDs while on foreign soil in case they got into more trouble than anyone, especially Jack, could get them out of. She doubted Torchwood carried quite as much weight in a museum in France as it did in the middle of downtown Cardiff.

"Gwen Cooper with Torchwood, Cardiff, on loan to UNIT. This is my partner, Doctor Owen Harper. Do you mind if we ask you a few questions?"

"UNIT? Does this have something to do with the incident last month?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, it does."

"Ah," the woman nodded. "I did not think we had seen the last of UNIT when they spoke with us that day."

"And you are?" Owen asked.

"Marie Christine Macé. I'm the curator of the museum."

"Were you here last month during the incident?" Gwen asked.

Marie nodded and tucked a loose strand of hair back into her chignon. Gwen suspected it was a nervous habit as the hair fell out again as soon as her fingers moved away from the back of her head.

"I realize that you've already told the police and UNIT everything," Gwen said, using her most friendly smile and best "nice copper" voice, "but if you could, it would help us to hear from you what happened."

"All right." Marie crossed her arms in front of her chest and looked over at the glass bottles on the display table. "It ended in this location, actually. There was a massive storm that night. Even though I know the building is completely sound and nothing could break the glass in the roof, the fury of this storm seemed enough to defy even Nouvel's careful planning."

"Nouvel?" Owen asked.

"The building's architect, Jean Nouvel," Marie replied. "He planned the space so that the ruins of the buildings could be seen from within the building and from without. That's why the roof and walls are all made of glass. It preserves the site but also allows us to show most of the exposed areas without risking damage to two thousand year old artifacts."

"And the storm damaged them?"

"No, but I was surprised when it did not. It was the worst storm we have had for as long as I can remember. Almost as bad as the legendary Prince's Storm," she said with a smile.

"What was that?"

"Oh, mostly an old children's tale whispered around campfires; you know how those things are. My Gran'mere used to tell it to me when I was child."

"Can't stand camping," Owen grumbled.

Marie smiled uncertainly but continued when Gwen nodded at her warmly.

"Oh… well, it was supposed to have been this mighty storm that tore through Périgueux around the time of the Crusades. The night lit up with magical colors and the thunder and rain lasted for five full days. When it was through, the whole village went out to see what damage had been done. In the center of a barren field they found two princes, lost and alone, nearly dead of the storm."

"And the storm a month ago - it had all these so-called magical colors in it as well?" Owen asked.

"No. But it was oddly magical; the clouds filled with lightning and stretched from one end of the window to the other. Does that make any sense to you?"

Gwen shook her head with her most reassuring smile. "I'm sure we'll figure it out. You said the incident ended here at this table?"

"Ah, yes. I had come into the main gallery to make certain that everything was all right and I noticed that something was missing from the display table."

"What?"

"Well, that is part of the problem. The item was never fully identified before it was put on display. My predecessor thought it was a good example to show how something can end up in a dig site that does not belong to the actual period of the ruins. But beyond confirming that it was not Roman in origin, we had yet to study it or determine where it did belong."

"What did it look like?"

"It was about the size of your hand," she said, pointing to Owen's fingers closed around the pen he was using to take notes. "It was a square made of clear glass."

"Were there any markings on the square?"

"No, it was completely smooth, like sea-tumbled glass."

"That it?" Owen asked, sounding bored.

Marie shrugged. "As I said, my predecessor was the one who choose to put it on display, not I. How it came to be in the collection, and what it was even used for, and by whom, I have no idea. We had not yet established a plan to study it when it disappeared from the museum."

"I see," Owen said. "Well, thank you for your time."

Owen turned away and Gwen started to follow, but then turned back.

"You wouldn't by any chance have anything written up about that legend you mention - the one about the storm and the two princes?"

"Actually, I believe it was printed in a local history recently. If you do not mind waiting a moment, I think I may I have something about it in my office that you can have."

"Yes, please. That would be very helpful."

Marie nodded to Gwen and then to Owen and walked away into the quickly-darkening museum.

When Gwen looked back toward Owen she found him standing along the railing overlooking the exhibit. He looked like he was deep in thought, or more likely a memory, Gwen thought. She walked over to stand shoulder to shoulder beside him.

Night had finally taken hold outside the museum. Inside, massive halogen lamps were coming on over the exhibit, casting harsh white shadows along the exposed stone of the old Roman site. Gwen shivered. She liked ruins in the daylight but there was something unnerving about seeing them in this silent tomb at night. She knew it was not meant to be creepy, and after everything she'd seen in Torchwood it kind of surprised her that she found human ruins creepy at all, but still, there it was.

Owen snorted beside her and she turned to look at him, a question in her eyes.

"You and your bloody legends. You'd turn the whole planet into a legend if you could."

"Oi! Watch it, you!" she said, but she couldn't help but smile at him. The anger and bitterness from earlier was gone and her friend had come back from his private hell. "I'll have you know…"

Her words were cut off as Ianto's voice called to them over the comms.

"Gwen! Owen!"

They both reached up to tap their ear pieces. Gwen spoke first, Owen a moment behind her.

"We're here, Ianto."

"What's wrong, mate?"

"Jack's been injured," Ianto said in a rush. "Tosh says there's something odd about it, like he's dead but not."

"Damn! Where are they?" Owen asked, all doctor.

"Tosh is bringing him back to the UNIT base now. Should be here in twenty-one minutes."

Gwen saw the curator walking back towards them and nodded to Owen as she tapped the mute button on her ear piece and walked over to Marie.

"Here you are," Marie said, handing Gwen a sky blue piece of paper. "I hope that will be helpful."

"Yes, thanks very much. You've been a big help. I think we're done here."

Gwen looked over at Owen, who nodded.

"If you have any other questions, feel free to contact me." Marie handed Gwen her business card. They shook hands and then Marie stood back to let Owen and Gwen walk past her towards the museum's exit.

Gwen flipped her comm unit back on in time to hear Ianto and Owen finish their conversation.

"We're just done here and on our way. Have a medical unit on standby for me; I'll want to take a look at Jack as soon as they arrive."

"Already done," Ianto told them.

"Good man."

They were out the door and into the car in less than five minutes.

 

Chapter Four

 

Twenty minutes later, Owen was pacing along the pier that housed the offices of UNIT's local base. The pier was on one of several small islets jutting into the River Isle as it ran through town. It didn't even have a street name, but Jack had joked to Owen that that only made it better for a secret base. Jack and his damn secrets! Owen nearly growled out loud, but settled for glaring at the gate that separated the pier from the access road instead.

Several members of the UNIT medical staff stood back near the building, far enough out of Owen's way to keep from being yelled at again, he assumed, but close enough to come when he bellowed. Gwen had opted to hover over Ianto, the poor sod, while he and Avenant coordinated with Tosh as she made her final approach to the base. This meant that everything was ready for him to work on Jack, except that Jack was still not on his exam table.

"They're here!" Ianto announced, pointing to the SUV just clearing past the gates.

Owen waited just long enough for Tosh to bring the car to a stop beside the base doors before he pulled open the passenger door.

"Jesus, Jack!" Owen said, pulling away Tosh's blood-soaked scarf. "What the hell attacked you?"

"Furry alien," Jack mumbled.

"What?" Gwen asked.

"The alien has fur," Tosh answered, coming around behind Gwen and Ianto. "He regained consciousness about halfway back. Started talking about the alien and other things, I think; I couldn't make out much of what he said."

"Help me get him on the gurney. I need to get him inside to get a good look at his injuries."

Ianto stepped past Gwen and took up a position on Owen's other side. Together they lifted Jack on to the waiting gurney.

Inside the exam room, Owen finally had room and light to work. He'd stripped off Jack's torn greatcoat and tossed it aside. Ianto would deal with it later, he knew. He pulled back the blood remains of Jack's waistcoat and button-down shirt and then cut away the equally bloodied undershirt. Owen wondered once again when this man would learn that there was such a thing as too many layers?

"Multiple contusions to his chest and shoulder. Three long cuts across his ribs. Damn, those are deep. Anyone else would be dead from blood loss, if nothing else. But not our Jack." Owen shook his head, dropped the sponge he had been using into the waste bin, grabbed another and wiped away more blood from Jack's wounds. "So why the hell aren't they closing up? He's usually more than halfway healed by this point."

Owen looked over at the projection screen to his right. A virtual x-ray showed where the cuts along the ribs had actually broken the bone and pierced one lung. He shook his head in amazement at the amount of damage Jack could sustain and keep going, the bloody idiot.

Pulling off his blood-covered gloves and exchanging them for fresh ones, he pointed to a piece of alien tech from his medical kit. They still hadn't given it a name, and he wasn't ready to ask Ianto to come up with one.

"Tosh, hand me the thingie there. I want to do a culture of this alien goo."

Tosh followed the direction of his outstretched hand perfectly but grabbed the wrong thing first. "No, the other one. Flat head, long nozzle."

She moved to the device just left of her first choice and looked up at him. He nodded. She smiled and handed it over to him.

"How long ago did you say this happened?" Owen asked as he scraped at the iridescent goo coating the edges of Jack's longest wound.

Ianto looked at his watch. "37.5 minutes ago now."

Tosh nodded.

"Tosh, did you see the alien?" Gwen asked

"Yes. It's beautiful."

"My height," Jack huffed and tried to sit up.

"None of that Jack," Owen said, pushing Jack gently back down into the table. "You can tell us about the furry alien just as easily lying down as you can sitting up."

"How'd you know i'waz furry?" Jack asked, his words slurred by blood loss.

"You might have mentioned it," Owen said patiently.

"Oh." Jack closed his eyes. "Cold."

"It was cold? Or you're cold?"

"'M cold."

Owen and Ianto exchanged a look. Jack was never cold.

"I will get a blanket from stores," Avenant said, turning to leave the room.

"We'll get you warmed up," Ianto assured Jack.

Owen looked back at the virtual scan of Jack on the screen. There was bruising along the back of Jack's skull, which was normal in someone who had just been through an accident or major fight, but more than a little unusual for Jack. Owen turned to Ianto and the girls.

"Keep him talking as long as you can. He might have a concussion, though that shouldn't be an issue with our Captain." Owen shook his head. "But just in case, let's assume the worst and follow protocol until I can get all my tests run, okay?"

"Right," Ianto agreed with a quick nod.

Tosh and Gwen both nodded.

"Jack, what else can you tell us about the alien?" Ianto asked.

Jack struggled to open his eyes, found Ianto, took his hand and smiled. "I got you a rose."

"Um… "

Owen hid a smile as Ianto actually blushed before plowing ahead.

"Thank you. Roses are lovely. The alien, Jack - what did it look like?"

"Tall. Bi-p… biped… "

"Bipedal?"

Jack nodded and then winced. "Yeah."

Owen leaned in. "Does your head hurt?" He poked around where the bruise was on the scan. "Here?"

"Yeah."

"Damn."

"What is it?" Ianto asked.

Owen didn't answer but continued with his explorations.

"What else can you tell us about the alien, Jack?" Gwen asked.

"Lots of fur, like a wolf or a cat. And a tail, I think I saw a tail. I like tails. Lovely things you can do with tails."

"Jack…" Ianto said, cutting off Jack's rambles.

"No fun."

"Never," Ianto smiled. "Did the alien say anything to you?"

"Was an'ry. Angry. At people stealing from him."

"Stealing what?" Tosh asked.

Jack shuddered and coughed. Owen checked Jack's oxygen levels and blanched. Something was definitely not right. "This cannot be happening."

"What is it? What's wrong?" Ianto asked, worry starting to show in his voice.

"He's not healing properly. If he would just die and regenerate everything would be fine. But as it is, he has a bloody hole in his lung, three cracked ribs, a concussion, and has lost more blood than should be possible. In anyone else, I would say he's dead. But since he's not, I don't know what to tell you!" Owen tossed his hands in the air in frustration. "What's worse, I don't know if operating on him will do any damn good!"

Gwen and Tosh each gasped.

"Yeah." Owen looked around the room and then bellowed. "Avenant, where the hell is that blanket?!"

"Here!" Avenant said running through the door and practically throwing the blanket at Owen

"About time." Owen, with help from Ianto, tucked the blanket around Jack and then hooked up an oxygen feed to see if that would do any good. Jack's coughing settled down but he'd slipped into a fevered half-sleep. They weren't going to get anything more out of him for a while.

"Ok, you lot - out!" Owen waved at the door. "I can't get any bloody work done with you lot hovering around. Go convene with your machines or something. I'll call you when you can come back and moon over Jack."

 

Chapter Five

 

Avenant sat on a stool beside Tosh, feeling at loose ends. They were in the room the team had been given to use for their main office while they were on UNIT territory. It was a purely functional space, as were the majority of the spaces within the UNIT base, with several workstations boasting internet-accessible computers and additional terminals connected to UNIT's extensive database. According to Tosh, it was a nice change from their normal accommodations, which made Avenant wonder what the Torchwood Hub looked like if this barren space was considered nice.

Tosh leaned back in her chair with her eyes closed and sighed. The monitor in front of her blinked with a prompt, but clearly she had forgotten it or was trying to work out what she wanted to have the computer do for her this time. Avenant wanted to run his hand through Tosh's deep black hair - true black, not the reddish sable of his - and blade-straight compared to his soft curls. He imagined that her hair would feel as soft as a thousand silk threads. He wanted to brush all of that lusciousness aside and massage the tension out her neck. He clamped a firm grip on those thoughts. One dinner did not grant him such permissions yet. He forced his thoughts back to work and the business of solving mysteries with people he barely knew. He needed to get to know these Torchwood members to know how far he could trust them.

One desk over, Gwen was pushing herself slowly around in a circle with her foot. He wasn't entirely sure why, but the woman grated on him. She reminded Avenant of the stories people liked to tell about Napoleon with his brilliant flashes of strategy and leadership bound to blistering moments of overbearing chaos. He chided himself for this. Just as Napoleon was hardly everything his critics accused him of being, Gwen could not be everything her critics in UNIT named her. Bossy was so often a term used for women who led without fear, whereas a man might be called merely assertive or doing his job. Certainly she had done well enough with her teammates were concerned for them to both respect and care for her.

He looked over at Ianto, who stood leaning against the wall near the medical suite. He looked calm, nearly serene, but after only a day of working with the young man, Avenant was aware that there were deep layers to Ianto that he worked hard to hide. Avenant knew that if Ianto had not been so tired he would have been standing ramrod straight instead of looking for all the world like he was holding up the wall instead of the other way around. Given Ianto's reaction to both Jack's offer to bring him roses and Jack's injuries, it was clear that the rumors about a deep affection between Torchwood Three's enigmatic leader and its ruthlessly efficient archivist were true. Avenant had decided several hours ago that he liked Ianto and if he and the Captain were happy together, then all the better.

Ianto looked up from his examination of the floor tiles and caught Avenant's eyes. He raised an eyebrow in a silent question. Avenant smiled softly and shook his head. Ianto nodded and pushed away from the wall with a muffled sigh.

"Coffee?" Ianto asked to the room in general.

"Oh god, yes please!" Gwen said her head popping up and her whole demeanor changing at the sound of that one word. Avenant laughed. Another rumor proven true - these people really did run on coffee, Ianto's in particular.

"Yes, please, if you wouldn't mind, Ianto?" Tosh replied quietly.

Ianto smiled at Tosh and nodded. "Avenant?"

"Merci, please."

"Won't be long." Ianto walked through the room and out into hall that led to the kitchen a few doors down.

"So what do we know?" Gwen asked first.

"The Rift energy UNIT has been tracking is definitely coming from the somewhere on the castle grounds," Tosh replied, tapping the scanner that was transferring its data to the desktop terminal in front of her. "It has the greatest concentration of Rift activity and the highest number of Rift strikes in the whole area dating back five hundred years."

"Now isn't that interesting? Owen and I met with a curator at the Vesunna Museum who gave me this." Gwen pulled out a folded piece of bright blue paper. "It describes a legend that the locals call The Storm of the Two Princes that dates back about five hundred years and has remarkable similarities the storm that happened outside the museum last month."

"Which version?" Avenant asked. He knew of several about princes local to the area.

Gwen described the story the curator had told them at the museum. By the time she finished, Avenant was nodding.

"Ah, as I thought. That's a variant of another local story," Avenant said, and then dipped his head apologetically. "We are rather fond of the twin prince stories here in Perigueux."

"Its okay; so is Gwen," Ianto said, walking in with a tray of coffee-filled cups. He winked at his co-worker as he placed a cup of the steaming liquid in her outstretched hands.

"Thank you," Gwen said, hugging the coffee to her, ignoring the blush that had crept along her cheeks.

Avenant looked at Ianto for clarification. Ianto shook his head and nodded for him to continue as he handed him and Tosh their coffees before settling into one of the two armchairs in the room. Avenant shrugged. It was hard to understand humor between tightly-knit groups of people, and Torchwood was proving, for all their ragged appearance, to be very tightly-knit indeed.

"My friend's daughter did it as her school play last year. The short version goes something like this – there are supposed to be two princes, twin brothers who are orphaned when a great storm kills their parents. One of the brothers reacts very badly to the parents' death and becomes cold and evil, while the other becomes kind and good-hearted. Eventually they fight over their inheritance. During the fight they lose several gifts from their parents, which makes them fight all the harder. In the end, the good brother wins and locks the evil brother away so he can never harm anyone ever again."

"Pretty standard legendary stuff. What happened to the gifts from the parents?" Ianto asked.

"No one knows. Lots of local kids spend their holiday looking for them. They call it the Hunt for the Horse and Key."

"Why?"

"Those are supposed to be two of the gifts that went missing: a magical horse, a golden key, a pair of gloves…"

"Oh lord, not more gloves!" Gwen groaned.

Avenant looked at the Torchwood team. They were all laughing, and yet there was a tension under their laughter that he did not understand.

"Sorry, old joke…" Ianto said by way of explanation. "Was that all of the gifts?"

"Um…" Avenant said, hating the hesitation in his voice. He went on quickly, hoping none of the others noticed his discomfort in speaking about the keys. "No, there was one more, I think… oh yes, a mirror."

Owen pushed open the door to the room and flopped down in the nearest chair. He looked horrible. Avenant had noticed that Owen made the loudest racket about being angry with the Captain for getting hurt, but he was also deeply upset at the same time. It seemed to Avenant that this was more than a doctor's frustration that someone under his care was injured again. Clearly there was deep affection for the Captain under all of Owen's bluster.

"I have bad news and bad news. Jack is not dead."

"We knew that, Owen!" Gwen exclaimed.

"That is bad news?" Avenant asked, beyond puzzled by these people.

"Well, yes." Owen raised a placating hand to Gwen before turning to Avenant. "Um, sorry, it's complicated; just trust me when I say that the situation is not good."

Owen looked at Tosh and then found Ianto's eyes and held them.

"He seems to be stuck somewhere between living and dying. And to make matters worse, his body is behaving for all intents and purposes like it was as…" He looked at Avenant and then to Gwen and shrugged. "Well… normal as any of us. So he's feeling every lump, bump and scrape the alien gave him. And they are all healing at an appallingly slow rate, even for a normal person."

"So what does all that mean?" Ianto asked, sitting forward in his seat, his eyes tightly focused on the doctor.

"It means…" Owen paused and ran a hand through his hair, "that something in the alien's blood got into Jack and is confusing his body enough that it doesn't know how to heal itself."

"Shit," Ianto said.

"Yeah. That about sums it up."

Ianto burst out of his chair to pace in a small loop from his desk to the door that lead to the medical suite and back to the desk. "We have to go back. To the castle. Find out more about the alien and get it to heal Jack."

"And just how do you plan on doing that?" Avenant asked.

They were all silent for a long moment before Tosh offered, "We have the scans of the area. We have the Rift data…"

"I do not think you will be able to just go back and ask the alien for help. You saw what it did to your Captain." Avenant looked around the room at the Torchwood team and watched them close him out of their thoughts.

"Owen." Ianto walked over to Tosh's side, his tension transformed into concentration. "Can you get Tosh a biological analysis of the alien based on the blood and skin samples you got off Jack?"

"Don't see why not. What are you thinking?"

Ianto put a hand on Tosh's shoulder. "Could you use that to run a reference check on alien species in the Torchwood and UNIT databases?

Tosh's face lit up and she nodded her head rapidly. "Of course. If anyone has met this creature before then we should have a record of them."

"And if we do, then we will know better how to approach it," Gwen finished for her with a beatific smile.

"Exactly," Ianto nodded.

"And what do we do for your Captain in the meantime?"

"I," Owen said pointedly, "will keep an eye on Jack and make sure he sleeps while the rest of you work out some safe way to get a cure for Jack out of the alien. That is my job, after all, unless one of you lot graduated from medical school all of a sudden?"

They all shook their heads.

"That's what I thought." Owen pushed himself out of his chair and waved to Ianto. "All right then. In you go, tea boy. Ten minutes, nothing more, and then Jack needs to sleep. If his body can't heal the way it normally does, we're just going to have to do this the old fashioned way."


	2. Part Two - The Mirror

Part Two ~ The Mirror

 

Chapter Six

 

Ianto rested his arms on the rail overlooking the Isle. His eyes marked the morning traffic on the other side of the river along Avenue Franklin Roosevelt: six blue cars, seven red, ten silver, a yellow, four more blue. On and on the count went like a calming hum. He noted the trees along the river's edge - which ones tilted towards the water and which towards the street, a French flag flying side by side with a German one 80 meters to the north, three more French flags within view to the south. He took a deep breath, held it for a long moment, feeling his lungs burn, then let it out on a long sigh.

A light breeze ruffled his hair and stirred the leaves above him. It was quiet here, even with the hum of traffic. No one was talking to computers or asking him questions that he didn't have answers to. Just sunlight reflecting off the water, the smell of fresh-cut grass from somewhere off to his left, and a family of swans - his mind filed away that there were six cygnets - paddled among the water grasses at the river's edge. He smiled softly, watching the mother swim out for a third time to nudge her brood forward when they strayed too far towards the river's stronger center.

He figured he had another thirty-two minutes before the coffeepot in the kitchen was drained and someone came looking for him. Not that this was his only job any more, but at the moment it felt like that was the only productive thing he could do.

They'd run through every option on who the alien was that had attacked Jack based on what little data they had, and it just wasn't enough. Tosh had admitted defeat before stumbling off to sleep on the conference room couch at 3:12 in the morning. Gwen, of course, had tried to argue with Ianto for another ten minutes until Owen had, either out of pity for Ianto or, more likely, self-preservation, ordered her to get some sleep anywhere in the base other than the conference room or the medical suite. Of course, then Owen had turned on Ianto and ordered him to sleep as well, but granted him permission to nick the chair in Jack's room. Ianto hadn't slept much, but it was better than arguing the same points over and over again.

"Damnit!" Ianto dropped his head between his arms and gripped the railing until his knuckles felt ready to pop. He pushed away from the railing and ran his hands through his hair. This was not the way things were supposed to work. Jack was supposed to be the invincible one. "Idiot," Ianto whispered, but whether he meant himself or Jack, he didn't know.

After the Incident with the cannibals out in the Beacons, Ianto had decided he was never again going to feel so helpless and unable to protect himself or the few people he named friends. It wasn't enough that Jack and Tosh both said that he had done well for his first trip into the field; he hated what had happened. But he also couldn't go back to just being the tea-boy. He had to be a part of the team, for himself, and that meant field work and putting himself and, by extension, the others at risk. So he'd started by taking a self-defense class to expand on the pitifully limited amount of training he'd gotten while working at Torchwood One. Then Jack had found out and challenged him to a sparring match. Twenty-eight minutes later Jack had grunted in approval, offered a few suggestions and corrections to his style and suggested a dojo that he might be interested in. Ianto had yet to find more than a few hours of free time to visit the Sensei there, ask some questions and watch a class, but he had to admit the style was one that both fascinated him and would likely fit who he was and how he saw the world.

After the sparring had come weapons training, not that Ianto didn't know how to use a gun; that was basic protocol for all Torchwood employees, no matter which branch they worked in. And Jack made sure that every new employee at Torchwood Three was personally certified by Jack himself in an assortment of weapons. They'd spent their time teasing each other on the firing range on more than one occasion before and after Lisa. But after the Beacons, Jack and Ianto both made sure that Ianto could qualify for marksman with nearly any gun he picked up. It had gotten to the point where Ianto could match Jack on the firing range with any weapon but that damn Webley.

So why did he feel so damn helpless and stupid?

A flock of sparrows burst from a nearby tree, zipping first towards the buildings of the base and then changing direction and heading out over the river then changing once more to fly off towards the center of town. Ianto watched them and wondered if they were some horrible punchline from the Universe. See, even we don't know which way to go or what to do. Fists on his hips, he shook his head, then let it drop back on his neck and stared up at the clouds. He was getting depressed in his frustration.

Straightening his head, he let out a sigh. He hated watching Jack die. He did it time and time again, and noted in his diary each one of the 397 times he knew about, because it was part of who Jack was. Ianto took it as part of who they were with each other that he would be there whenever he could for Jack when he came back to life. But this time Jack wasn't dead. He was stuck somewhere between life and death and hurting and there wasn't a damn thing Ianto could do to fix that. There was no category to put this situation into, no files to organize, no order to be found. Nothing to do except… except fix it. Find the answers to the riddle and fix what was keeping Jack trapped.

Of course, Gwen was never going to approve, and Owen was all too likely to call him a romantic fool for trying it, but to hell with it. Organization and keeping track of data and details were his skills, so this was his job to do. Tosh, at least, would understand.

"Right." He smoothed his hands down along the front of his suit and adjusted his tie. "Time to go."

Ianto turned away from the river and its solitude and walked back toward the base. He'd make another pot of coffee, maybe even put out a few of the pastries he'd sequestered from this morning's bakery run. He'd really hoped to save them for a late night snack for the team, but this would serve his purposes better. He'd say goodbye to Jack and then he'd be off.

 

Twenty-six minutes later Ianto sat beside an unconscious Jack in the medical suite, trying to explain the unexplainable.

"I can't just sit here and wait, Jack. I know its stupid, and you'd stop me if you could. But you can't." Ianto paused and looked at Jack's face. There were deep creases between the other man's brows. His eyes darted back and forth under his closed lids, but he never woke or moved in anyway to indicate that he could hear what Ianto was saying.

Ianto took a deep breath and kept going. "Which is why I have to go. We know where the answers are. We have to go back to the castle. I have to go. I'll be careful, I promise. I'll get the information we need and come right back."

Ianto leaned in to kiss Jack on the lips. They were still so cold. Then he stood up and walked out of the room without looking back.

Working as quietly and unobtrusively as possible, Ianto logged into the computer at his assigned workstation, hooked up his PDA and downloaded all of Tosh's notes on the location of the castle, Rift signs for the area, and everything they had come up with so far about the alien and what had happened to Jack. Disconnecting his PDA, he thought for a moment about working to hide the evidence of his actions, but concluded that Tosh would figure out what he had done no matter how hard he tried, so he left everything as it was. Next he went to the area that they had been given to store their gear. He pulled an extra clip for his gun, then filled a backpack with an assortment of things he thought he might need if he were out overnight. The UNIT SUVs were almost as well-stocked as their own back in Cardiff, but he preferred knowing that he had his own tools to hand rather than trusting that someone else had packed what he needed when all hell broke loose.

Slipping out into the parking lot without being seen by half the base took a little more work than Ianto had wanted. He managed to pull a set of keys off the pegboard at the guard station while the guards were investigating a sudden influx of hungry black birds on the other side of the lot. It was a horrible waste of good croissants, but at least the birds seemed to be enjoying themselves.

A click of the key fob and he had his borrowed vehicle. Moments later, he had Tosh's coordinates loaded into the SUV's GPS. Then, hoping like hell that UNIT guards in France were as slow to count keys and cars as their English counterparts, Ianto was out of the lot, off the pier, and at the turnabout to Allee du Port and heading towards the hills.

 

Just as Tosh and Jack had described, part way along the dirt road that led off of Rue des Menestriers du Perigord, Ianto found the wall of roses growing across the road. He stopped the car and got out. He grabbed his backpack from the boot and then queued up Tosh's information about the gate and hidden castle on his PDA. After dodging brambles and walking around trees for 23 meters, he wished he had thought to bring a pair of jeans and his hiking boots to the base, because even three meters was far longer than he felt anyone should have to dodge such things in a suit. He did, however, find the gate.

Pale green lines of light flickered along the edges of the wall, but stopped just at the archway that formed the gate. The light shimmered around thorn-filled canes of rich pink roses that ran along the side and across the top, but the gate itself appeared dull and oddly dead.

Ianto clicked through Tosh's notes about the gate and found the programming codes that had worked to trigger its locks. He switched modes on the PDA and entered the codes. For a moment nothing happened, then the light lines along the wall flared blindingly bright. Ianto closed his eyes and waited out the effect. When the light dimmed, he opened his eyes again to find that the gate unchanged, but the area around the gate no long shimmering with green light. Figuring that one way or another the gate had to be open now, he pushed the iron and wood panels aside and stepped across the threshold.

Adjusting the pack on his back, Ianto put his foot on the cobble-stoned path and hoped that he was right and that the answers he needed were behind the castellated ramparts at the end of this road.

 

Chapter Seven

 

Beast stood in the shade of a large oak tree, watching a lone white peacock strut and flirt before a group of mixed green and blue peahens. Its enormous tail with its white eyes at the end of its long white feathers was stunning to Beast and the male bird, but the females always seemed to prefer the green and blue males that wandered the grounds. Beast wondered if it was merely nature linking like to like or if the hens knew something about the all-white bird and his mysterious plumage that neither of the males were aware of. Beast chuckled. Not likely, he thought. The hens knew very little in their very tiny heads past when feeding time was and where their chicks were. The white fellow was simply not part of their thoughts at all, much like Beast himself, so long as he stayed downwind of them.

Beast sighed. He knew that it should not bother him that his own birds feared him. It was the natural reaction of prey to predator, and he was, at least in part, a predator, but he wanted to be more to them than that. He wanted to be more than that to someone. Anyone. His heart remembered connections that flowed like sunlight and warm water, and he longed to be washed in each again. Five hundred years of solitude was maddening and painfully lonely.

"At least that is nearly at an end," Beast said quietly to himself as he paced away from the birds and deeper into the garden. He flipped the trailing end of his cloak over his shoulder and hooked a clawed thumb into his belt. His tail dragged through the grass and stray leaves. The protections on the grounds were failing. One way or another, his life of isolation would be over soon.

A branch snapped behind Beast.

Beast slowed, but did not stop walking. His ears twitched, hunting for more sounds. There, to his right, came the crunch of leaves underfoot and the swish of a willow branch as it brushed past a body. He sniffed the air and this time he did stop. Anger filled him and he hissed as he caught a smell much like that of the human who had invaded his home and stolen the Rose last night. He'd sworn to kill the man, and if he was foolish enough to come back, then so be it. Beast closed his eyes and took a series of regulated breaths, triggering the release of toxin from the venom sacs under his eyes to the channels in his fangs.

An electronic chime echoed in the garden, startling Beast; the pitch of the sound was painful to his sensitive ears. He whirled around and opened his mouth, venom spraying out across a face that was nothing like that of the man from last night.

The man cried out, raising his arms to protect his face and then falling to the ground as the toxins in the venom set to work.

Beast clamped his mouth shut, swallowing the bitter remnants of his venom, and stepped back. The man writhing on the ground was not the same man who had invaded his home the night before. A quick sniff told him that the man had nothing on his person that belonged to Beast, only soil and broken leaves on the soles of his shoes. This was not the man that had removed the power source for the barrier wall.

Beast crouched down beside the man. His breathing was becoming harsh and shallow. It would not be long now before he died. Beast felt deep conflict in his heart. The one on the ground before him had done nothing to earn such a death, and yet he was here, on the grounds, an intruder who smelled of the thief. Those things could not be dismissed. Beast growled low in his throat. He couldn't let this man die because Beast had been surprised. That much he owed the man. Then, after they had talked and the other had explained why he was here, there would be time to decide what to do.

There was only one thing to do. He had to heal him; he had to repair the damage and make right what was wrong. Beast lifted the man off the ground and carried him gently up the garden stairs and into the castle.

Beast brought him to his old bedroom; he never used it anymore but it still had the furnishings that he'd once loved. With its pale stone walls and floor, it would be cold and need a fire started to warm it quickly, but once it was warm it would be the ideal place for healing. It was also high in the south tower, far enough away from the space Beast now called his room for him to feel safe.

He lay the man on the tall four-poster bed, removed his shoes and noticed that there were flecks of venom at the toes; they would need to be replaced. The sleeves of both the jacket and the deep red shirt underneath were ruined. There were large burn holes where the venom had sprayed onto the fabric and eaten through to the man's skin. Beast stripped him of the jacket and shirt, as well as the vest which rested between them, tossing them in a pile on the floor to deal with later.

Turning to the dressing table, he accepted a bowl filled with water from the ever-present helper arms. He washed the venom from the injured man's face and off of his neck and arms. The man shivered under the cool cloth and tried to pull away. Beast shook his head. The man was burning with fever; this was the final stage.

He reached into the pouch at his waist and pulled out a crystal cube with the image of a glove carved into one side. He held the cube over the man's chest, pressed a button and willed the device to heal the damage he had caused.

Color and light flowed out of the crystal and down across him, bathing him in layers of deep blue and purple light. He shuddered. His chest heaved and he cried out soundlessly as the crystal purged the poison from his system. The welts caused by the venom shrank away. His shivering stopped and his breathing slowly eased until he was taking deep, normal breaths.

Beast pressed the button again and the light vanished, leaving the room somehow plainer and colder. He slipped the cube back into his pouch and sat down heavily in the chair beside the bed. He was drained and would need to feed soon to replenish what the crystal had taken from him to fuel the healing work. It had been a very long time since he had used it on anyone other than himself. He had forgotten how different that felt.

On the bed, the man sighed and stirred. Beast stood slowly and went his side. The man coughed, his whole frame shaking with effort.

"Do not try to sit up," Beast said, putting a hand out to press the muscular chest back into the pillows. "It will take you a few days to fully recover from the venom."

"What happened?"

"I thought you were someone else. I am sorry."

The man looked at Beast, a million questions in his eyes. He only nodded then looked around the room, his eyes growing wider with each turn of his head. "Where am I?"

"This room is the south tower of the castle. You should be comfortable here while you recuperate from the healing."

"You healed me? After you attacked me?"

Beast nodded, uncomfortable, but he was unwilling to lie unless he had to.

"Why?"

"You were not who I thought you were, and I reacted badly."

"Oh." The man pushed himself up into a sitting position, triggering a coughing spell.

Beast wanted to push the man back into the pillows, but he suspected that if their positions were reversed he would want to be sitting up to confront his attacker. He held his tongue and merely watched as the man adjusted pillows against the carved headboard and finally sank into the pile with a pained sigh.

"Why did you come here?" Beast asked when the man was quiet again.

"I came to find a cure for my Captain."

Beast reared back, his fur bristling with his anger. "You are with him!"

"I work for him, yes," the man said quietly. "But he meant no harm."

"He stole from me. That is harm enough! He got what he deserved."

"He is very sick, trapped between living and dying because of something in your blood that has infec… gotten into his blood."

"It is fitting." Beast turned and stalked toward the open doors to the room's balcony. "The punishment for stealing my Rose is death."

The man looked at Beast in confusion. "Jack stole a rose?"

"He could have taken anything else and I would have let him live, but not my Rose."

"I'm sure he didn't mean to take your rose. It's just that we were following energy signatures. That's what we do.

"Why?" Beast looked back over his shoulder at him, intrigued despite his anger.

"To keep people safe. We track the energies to make sure they won't harm people, and offer help to anyone who needs it."

"What kind of help?"

"Whatever help might be needed."

Beast regarded him for a long moment, trying to decide how to deal with the man before him. There were layers to the offer Beast saw in his eyes, but after so many years of hiding away, he no longer knew how to trust such things. Something moved in his heart that made him uncomfortable. He took a deep breath and forced his mind to concentrate on the issues at hand. This was no innocent bystander, but an accomplice in the Captain's crimes. Beast nodded to himself, his decision made.

He walked across the room to a large wooden chest and matching wardrobe.

"There are clothes in here that you may wear as you like. Yours were ruined by the venom." Beast pointed to the pile of clothes on the floor. "When you feel well enough, you may walk about the castle and the grounds. But since you work for this Captain who took my Rose, you may not leave. If he has not paid the price for his actions, then you must pay it for him."

Beast stared at him, daring him to deny the fairness of his actions. The man opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again and nodded.

Satisfied, Beast walked to the door, then stopped as another thought occurred to him. He turned back to the man. "You will join me for dinner in the main hall at seven. Do not be late."

Then with a flip of his cloak he was out of the room and into the relative safety of the hallway.

 

Chapter eight

 

The computer in front of Tosh was ages slower than the systems back at the Hub, but it was trying its best to do as she asked. She looked over at her laptop to find that it was happily chugging away on the search she'd assigned it half an hour after she'd set up the search on the UNIT machine; hers was 85% complete, of course. As she watched the working icon rotate on the UNIT box, it occurred to her that these machines were a bit like the younger sisters to Mainframe and all the machines they logged into day after day back in Cardiff. Those, she had chivied and nursed into something more than most hardware designers could have dreamed of, using more than a few pieces of alien tech. Working with UNIT's slower, uneducated siblings made her realize just how happy she was that Jack let her dig into in the archives and their own database, and how nice it would be to get home to her machines.

The screensaver flipped, on covering the monitor with wiggling pipes that drew themselves along the screen in different directions, widths and colors. Tosh watched the animation for a minute or two, and then clicked the mouse. The colored pipes vanished and her twirling working icon returned. She sighed and closed her eyes. So much for seeing the beautiful French country side. The room they were in didn't even have windows. Not that there was much to see where the base was located, but the trees along the riverbank and open sky would have been nice right about now.

A familiar aroma filled her nose, followed by the sound of ceramic clinking onto metal as a cup was placed beside her on the desk. Tosh opened her eyes. Avenant was standing next to her, one hand just letting go of the coffee cup, the other offering a plate out to her.

"I thought you might be hungry. And knowing how you all run on coffee, I figure you must be ready for some by now."

Tosh looked up at him and smiled. "Thanks." She slipped her fingers into the handle of the coffee mug and brought it to her lips. Blew on the hot surface and then gave in and took a sip. "Mmmm. Delicious."

Avenant placed the plate down on the desk beside her, a single black curl falling across his face as he moved. She had to tilt her head down to hide her smile. She loved his curls and she really, wanted to see them let loose from the ponytail he kept them in. She imagined they would look like the mane of some alien cat. At that, she dropped her chin and took a deep breath. She really should not be having such thoughts about a man she barely knew!

When she thought she'd gotten her face composed well enough to look Avenant in the face, if not his lovely green eyes, she looked up. He'd arranged an assortment of grapes, sliced apples and cheese, along with several chunks of fresh bread. Tosh stacked a piece of cheese on some bread and settled back in her chair with a hum of contentment.

Avenant pulled a chair up next to her and sat down. He smelled like the apples he'd just cut, sweet and tasty.

"So," he said around a bite of apple. "Have you beaten our computers into submission yet?"

Tosh chuckled. "Not yet."

"Well, I am certain you will have them all well trained quite soon. I have faith in your talent."

"You've hardly seen my talent," she said with a wicked grin.

"This true," Avenant replied, leaning forward to feed her the last bit of his apple slice. "But you do know you are a legend within technical circles, do you not?"

She looked at him, surprised. People occasionally said things like this to her but it made no sense. She did what she did. Computers talked to her; that was just who she was. She shrugged. "I never gave it much thought."

"You are. The impressive Miss Sato. Impressive and enigmatic, since no one outside of Torchwood ever seems to be able to reach you."

Tosh shook her head, uncertain or, she whispered to herself, unwilling to accept the truth of his words. "I'm just busy, is all."

"Of course," Avenant said with a grin. He bit down on a slice of cheese.

Tosh knew he was watching her squirm, and while she didn't mind him watching her, this wasn't the way she wanted to be squirming because of him, so she changed topics.

"And what about you? You didn't say much at dinner. What's your story?"

"Ah, well I am a simple student at the feet of the master."

"Oh!" Tosh tossed a grape at Avenant. It bounced off his nose and fell to floor, rolling under the desk for the mice to find in the middle of the night.

Avenant laughed, but threw up his hands in surrender when she picked up a second grape and threatened to throw that at him as well.

"All right! All right!" Avenant slapped his hands down on his thighs. Tosh noticed, as she had the other night, that he kept his nails longer than most men. They were nearly feminine in shape and length. In the light of the office she could see that they had a slight iridescent sheen to them. "I have been technology-mad for as long as I could remember. My mother used to say that I was born with tools in my hands and codes in my eyes." He grinned. "I got to spend a year at Berkeley in the Engineering department before life intervened and I had to come home. I finished my degree at Ecole Polytechnique."

"What happened?"

"My father died."

"I'm so sorry." Tosh reached out and placed a hand on his knee. It was warm to the touch and she could feel his muscles flex just above the patella.

"Thank you," he said, covering her hand with his own and looking at their intertwined fingers for a moment before continuing. "He had not been well, but I felt it was better to be home after that, closer to all the things that reminded me of him. He would have wanted it that way."

"And your mother?"

"Died when I was just a child, along with my younger brother. So you see, we are much alike. Separated from our families by the exigencies of life."

Tosh didn't know what to say to that. She was separated from her parents now, but she'd had them both throughout her childhood and couldn't imagine growing up without one of them.

The silence between them was broken as Gwen walked into the room, looking from desk to desk.

"Have either of you seen Ianto?"

"No," Avenant said. "I thought he was sitting with Jack."

Gwen came to a stop beside Tosh and folded her arms across her chest, aggravation clear on her soft face. She shook her head. "I just checked; he's not there. Owen hasn't seen him in several hours."

"Coffee run?" Tosh asked, grasping at straws. Back in Cardiff when they couldn't find Ianto he was usually in one of three places: Jack's office, the archives or out getting them food or coffee.

Gwen sucked her lower lip in between her teeth and shook her head again. "There's a machine in the kitchen. Ianto even approved the beans when we arrived the other day."

"Well," Avenant chuckled. "I am sure our supply officer was grateful to hear that."

Gwen and Tosh smiled.

"Yep." Gwen sighed and changed topics. "So, any luck with the database search?"

"We have fifteen possible matches based on the limited size of the sample in previous collection efforts," Tosh replied, turning towards her laptop. She was pleased to see it had delivered the results she had requested.

"Woosh. That's a big sample for aliens."

Tosh nodded and pointed to the screen. "There are three species that have cat-like features but neither of them are bipedal. Two of the others are bipedal but have no fur. Four more are both bipedal and have some kind of hair, but no other mammalian characteristics. The rest don't match at all."

"So where does that leave us?"

"I wish I knew. Jack wasn't exactly coherent when I found him, so his data isn't the most reliable. And I didn't get a very good look at the alien."

"Gwen! Tosh!" Owen called from the hallway.

"In here!" Gwen replied, turning towards the door.

"Jack's awake and refusing to take his meds like a good boy until he gets an update from one or both of you."

"Well then," Avenant said with a smile that Tosh was starting to like more with each passing moment. "I shall keep working on refining the search while you ladies go talk to your Captain."

"Thank you." Tosh stood to follow Gwen out of the room, then turned and smiled at Avenant. "I have another set of parameters just queuing up now; if you could start on those, that would be a big help."

"Certainly." Avenant's smile softened. He stood up and stepped towards her, taking her hand in his and bringing it towards his lips. His eyes never left her face as he placed a soft kiss on the back of her wrist. "It would be my pleasure."

Tosh blushed and reluctantly withdrew her hand from his. Oh, how she wished they could come to France for a real vacation just once.

"Thank you," was all she let herself say before following Gwen out of the room.

 

Tosh caught up with Gwen just inside the medical suite. Jack was awake and fussing at the restraints Owen was insisting on and Gwen was trying to distract him with only limited success.

"…are you feeling?" Gwen asked

"Like I was run over by a train." He tried to sit up and groaned in pain as his movements pulled on the wounds across his chest.

"I told you to be careful," Owen grumbled, putting an arm under his shoulders. Gwen tucked several pillows behind his back and Owen eased him into the new position.

"I am."

"Yeah, your usual definition of careful."

Gwen sat down on the chair beside the bed, a stray pillow in her lap. "Jack, can you remember anything else about the alien that attacked you?"

"It looked like a mix of creatures." Jack ran a bandaged hand through his hair and sighed. "Kind of chimera-like with bits of cat and wolf, and I could have sworn I felt scales when I grabbed its arm."

"Have you ever met anything like it before?"

"No, not that I can remember." Jack shook his head. "There was something odd about it, almost like its parts weren't holding together well."

"Some of its hair came off in my hand when the alien transported Jack and me back to the SUV," Tosh said. "That was the bag I gave you, Owen, after we got Jack settled."

"Huh. I haven't had time to look at that yet. Hang on a sec."

Owen walked over to the work table across from the bed. He pulled on a pair of gloves and then took Tosh's sample bag out of a storage container. He extracted the sample and put it under the medical scanner. He sat down at the machine to make adjustments as he studied the alien pieces under the scope.

"Bloody hell." Owen pushed himself away from the machine with an expletive. "That is the weirdest thing I have seen in a long time, and that's saying something."

"What is it?" Jack asked.

"It might as well be a Chimera, for all it's like anything else in the universe that we've seen. Possibly anything else that exists. I think you're right, Jack; I think it was, or is, falling apart. These pieces just don't belong together, and whatever was holding them in place is losing power."

"So this means what?" Gwen asked looking from Jack to Owen. "That the alien is… sick?"

"Yeah, yeah... I think so. I think this alien is very ill. Whatever brought it here, or kept it here, and kept it alive for so long isn't working any longer."

"Which means this just became a rescue mission," Jack said. "We need to find out what the alien was living off of. It can't be anything too harmful or this region would have been on UNIT's problem list a long time ago."

"Actually," Tosh chimed in. "I think it might be just the opposite."

"What are you thinking, Tosh?"

"This is one of the more prosperous and abundant regions of France, and has been for at least 500 years."

"For as long as the alien has been here," Gwen said.

"A symbiotic relationship?"

"We need to find out how that works." Jack's shoulders drooped and he started to cough.

"No. You need to rest." Jack started to protest but Owen cut him off. "As your doctor I am ordering you back to sleep, and the girls out. Trust us to figure this out, Jack."

 

Chapter Eight

 

Ianto stepped across the threshold into the dining hall. The room was empty and quiet, with no sign of the alien. The only light came from the fire burning in the fireplaces at either end of the large room and from some soft light source that filtered in through the windows that looked out into the garden.

The clock on the mantle behind him struck seven, its bright chimes dancing around the room from surface to surface. Candles in golden candelabra flared along the walls, fifteen per wall, filling the enormous room with warm light.

Ianto faltered in the sudden brightness, then took a deep breath and smoothed his hands down along the soft black wool of the single-button tuxedo he had chosen to wear. It was far more luxurious than he was used to, but at least it looked like something he knew what to do with. Many of the other items in the wardrobe the creature had shown him looked more like things out of an art history book than items he could actually see himself wearing.

Steeling himself to deal with the unknown, Ianto took a half a dozen more steps into the dining hall. When nothing untoward happened, he allowed himself to relax just a bit and look around.

The room was much as Tosh had described it to them. It was nearly empty except for the one end that Ianto was in. There the table had once again been set for two with deep blue cloth that hung down in pools to the floor, while gold-edged china and crystal glasses shimmered in the candle light. There was an enormous arrangement of flowers at the center of the table and more of the odd human-armed candelabra that seemed to be the main source of light for the castle.

As Ianto walked the length of the fireplace, noting the unusual bits of what looked like alien art hidden among the gold candelabra and abundant flowers, he felt the eyes Tosh mentioned following him. He looked over his shoulder, but saw no one in the room. Turning back to the mantle, he noticed that the eyes carved into the dark marble had changed position. He walked back to the other end of the fireplace. This time the assortment of eyes on each side of the hearth turned with him, letting him see that they were tracking his movements.

"Do not be afraid."

Ianto turned to see that the creature had entered the hall and was watching him from the other side of the table. He'd left the cloak off for dinner, Ianto noticed.

"Okay."

"They are merely curious about you."

"They?"

"Un peu meilleur ami," When Ianto looked confused, the creature translated, pointing towards the carvings in the marble. "Little friends."

"Friends. So they're alive?"

"In a sense. They share our warmth and breath when we - when I - am in this room. At other times they sleep. But they are not particularly smart or talkative."

Ianto looked back at the faces in the carvings. He wondered, as he knelt in front of the closest carving, what they thought of their master's explanation. One particularly vibrant pair of eyes stared back at him as though trying to learn as much about him as he was about the carving. "Do they dream?" he wondered out loud.

"Sometimes, I think so. At least it has seemed that way to me when I have come in late in the night, and one or more of them are shifting and turning, much as you or I might in our sleep. It is hard not to think then that they might dream and wonder what they see."

"Mmm."

Ianto stood and turned to face the creature. They stared at each other for long moments and Ianto had the feeling that it was as confused about how to go on as he was. The arms of the candelabrum at center of the flower arrangement on the table took the choice away from both of them. It released its candles and reached down to grasp a crystal decanter of red wine and filled two glasses. It held both out, one to each side of the table, for Ianto and its master.

The creature took the proffered drink but made a sound under his breath that seemed distinctly disgruntled and rather like Jack when one of the team had done something wise that he wished he had done.

Ianto hid a smirk and took the glass in front of him. He looked at the wine and heard a thousand bad movie plots rumble through his head. This was the point where the hero or heroine always made the mistake of drinking the poisoned wine and died a horrible death or spent the rest of their lives asleep behind a wall of thorns.

"You do not wish to drink the wine?" the creature asked quietly.

Ianto looked up, startled, and mumbled the first thing that came to mind. "I'm not thirsty."

The creature contemplated his own wine. "You think I will poison you."

"It is a possibility."

"I have already had one opportunity to kill you, yet here you stand."

"True. Though you did poison me."

"An error of judgment and timing."

They stared at each other for a long moment, then the creature raised its glass to Ianto and took a deep drink. When it didn't fall to the ground writhing in pain and agony, Ianto nodded and laughed softly at his own imagination. He raised his glass to the creature and took a sip.

"Very nice."

The creature inclined its head in acknowledgement and then waved to the two chairs pulled up to the table. "Please, sit. I hope that the food will please as well."

Ianto studied it a moment longer, then took the offered seat. The hands of the candelabra filled his plate with steaming roast beef, lightly sautéed vegetables and a rice dish that smelled of cardamom and saffron. Hot rolls where unwrapped and placed along side the meat and then second glass was filled with water and placed nearby.

The smells from the table set Ianto's stomach growling and reminded him that the last thing he had eaten was a nutrient bar in his room after the creature had left him to rest. He took a bite of food, savoring the rich juice of the beef, then noticed that his host was still standing across the table watching him.

"You're not eating?" Ianto put his golden utensils down and looked up at it.

The creature shook its head slowly. "Very little human food, beyond red wine and a few sulfur-rich plants, agree with me."

"Yet you have all this food in case of guests? That's convenient."

"I have some supplies that allow me to provide for what few guests I choose to receive, yes."

Ianto wasn't sure what to make of any of this. "Do you watch all your guests eat?"

"Some," the creature reluctantly agreed. "But never this… closely."

Ianto raised an eyebrow.

The creature looked down at the wine in its glass. "Do you mind me watching you dine?"

"It's your castle." Ianto opened his arms out to the wide walls of the room. "You are Lord here."

"No!" it said in a burst of sound and emotion. "I'm not. There is no Lord here but you."

Ianto sat back in surprise. The creature made no sense. One minute it was angry and telling Ianto he was a prisoner, bound to pay off Jack's debt; the next, he was implying that Ianto was completely free, and more than that, in control of the situation.

"I revolt you."

Ianto shook his head. "You confuse me."

"My form is hideous - do no lie!" It smashed its glass into the fireplace and paced into the shadows so that Ianto had to turn to watch it as it prowled the hall.

Ianto thought about how to explain his thoughts. It wasn't as though he needed to keep the nature of his work a secret from the other - he was the alien they had come looking for. But did this alien know about the other ones in the universe? Ianto always assumed all aliens knew about each other, but how could it, having been trapped on Earth for five hundred years? Ianto thought about how Gwen would explain something to a frightened parent or child, with her quiet words and compassionate face, and how often that seemed to get them all through the really bad moments. He took a deep breath.

"Your appearance is… odd to me. I have seen things I never expected to see. Aliens that reminded me of lion fish with legs, gas clouds that could think and feel…" Ianto shuddered. "Tin men that tried to take over the world. You don't seem any more or less unusual in comparison to all of that."

The creature appeared on the edge of the candlelight, a stunned look in his eyes. Ianto took a chance and pushed his chair back. It startled like a cat at the sound, but stayed within the circle of light watching Ianto. Ianto stood up and walked slowly towards it.

"Do you have a name?" Ianto asked softly.

"I did once, long ago. Now I am simply 'Beast'."

"That seems more like a punishment than a name."

Beast dropped his head to his chest. "It is fitting. In my heart there is kindness, but I am in truth a monster."

Ianto gazed at Beast, watching the rise and fall of breath beneath the silk tunic with its gemstones winking in the firelight on his broad chest. The collar was cut in a deep slash that showed off the silky black and silver fur that covered his face, head and neck. And just around the eyes, the fur gave way to smooth skin that looked patterned or scaled. The color and texture was mirrored along his hands before ending in the powerful, yet oddly delicate, claws. The deep black fur appeared again in the agitated tail that swished back and forth behind Beast as he studied a crack on the tile floor. The mixture of cat and serpent certainly gave Beast an unusual appearance, but the depth of pain and understanding within the yellow eyes was deeply familiar.

"There are many who are monstrous yet hide it behind a beautiful exterior."

Beast raised his head and stared at Ianto, uncertainty written in every line of his body.

"What may I call you?" Beast asked at last.

"Ianto… Ianto Jones."

"Ianto." Beast nodded. "Would you mind… may I sit with you while you eat?"

"Yes," Ianto said, feeling like some Lord granting the wish of a petitioner, and not sure if that was okay with him.

Beast waited until Ianto had taken his seat again before pulling out the other chair and settling himself in the blue velvet upholstery. The serving hand filled another glass with wine and offered it to Beast, who took it and drank it down in one long gulp. The hand filled the glass again and Beast leaned back in the chair, looking more at ease than Ianto had seen him all night.

"Is everything to your liking in your room?"

"The room is lovely." Ianto stroked the silk lapel of his tuxedo. "The clothes are some of the finest I have ever seen, thank you."

"Still you are uncomfortable."

"I am not used to being waited upon. I see my job as to take care of others, to maintain the facilities, coordinate mission details and organize the necessary files. I make sure they have what they need to do their jobs." Ianto picked at the food on his plate with his fork. "My family was from the estates… not well off. We'd little money to spare on treats as kids. So this…" He waved to the serving hands and then wider to the opulence of the castle. "This is more than I am used to."

"One as handsome as you should not be cleaning up after other people; they should be tending to you."

Ianto was flustered. He thought of himself as reasonably good-looking, but Jack, and now this alien who barely knew him, both called him handsome. This was yet another thing he didn't know what to do with or think about in his current situation. He walled his thoughts away for another time and hid behind the mask of politeness.

"Thank you."

Beast nodded, then stood.

"Everything in this castle is yours. Your every whim will be fulfilled. Do not seek to leave the grounds or you will be lost to the energies that conceal the castle. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Farewell then. Until tomorrow."

Beast walked out of the room in a swirl of blue and gold silk, leaving Ianto alone with his thoughts, the serving hand that was offering to refill his wine glass, and the eyes that continued to watch him from the fireplace. It was possibly the most unusual dinner he'd ever had in his life.

 

Chapter Nine

 

Gwen stared at the readings on her monitor. They made absolutely no sense. She understood all the numbers and words; it was their conclusion she couldn't fathom. It was maddening. Looking at them again changed nothing.

She rested her head in her hands and rubbed at her temples. She was spending too many long hours in front of the bloody computer again. She missed Rhys and her bed and even their funny, dark Hub. This working in other people's spaces was just not as much fun as she had hoped it would be. And really, how much of France had she gotten to see? The airport, the inside of several cars, their hotel, the UNIT base, and that archeological museum. That was not sightseeing. Of course, they were not on vacation, no matter how many ways Jack had tried to make out like that's what they were going to be doing when he told them about the mission. Damn fool man. Damn fool her for believing his sweet words.

Gwen rolled her head on her neck and sighed. She was wool-gathering instead of problem-solving. It was time to get some help.

"Tosh, can you look at these reading for me?" Gwen asked

The other woman looked up from her own monitor with a smile. "Sure thing."

Tosh joined Gwen at her desk and leaned in to look at the information on the screen. She tapped some keys and Gwen saw the information shift, numbers and equations resolving into a map of the local area overlaid with a graph of all the Rift activity for the last week. Gwen knew that the tightest bundle of numbers and graph markers was right over the area where the alien's hidden castle was. She just didn't understand what the indicators were trying to tell them.

"That's odd."

"What is it?" Gwen asked.

"It looks like…" Tosh tapped a few more keys and another graph overlaid the first. Tosh pointed to the new image. "See here… there are cracks forming in the barrier around the castle."

"But I thought you said you couldn't see the barrier there, let alone the castle, until you were past the gates."

Tosh shook her head, still looking at the graphs. "We couldn't. Only now the barrier has changed. Or something has changed it enough so that our systems can register its signal."

"What does that mean, exactly?"

"I'm not sure." Tosh stood back and tapped a finger against her lower lip. "But I would guess that whatever was powering the barrier around the castle has stopped working."

"Just like whatever was feeding the alien?" Gwen asked.

"I think so, yes."

"Could they be the same thing?"

"I suppose so, but without more data, I can't say for certain."

"So how do we find out?" Gwen asked, hoping for a miracle.

Tosh shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know yet."

Gwen scrubbed her hands over her face, trying to push the tiredness and frustration away through force of will. "I wish we knew where Ianto was… "

"Still no answer on his mobile?" Tosh asked.

"None. Owen had to sedate Jack after he told him that Ianto'd gone missing. This is not like him, Tosh."

"Well, actually, it sort of is. If he thought there was something he could to help… He might have gone… He probably did go! Oh, Gwen, you're brilliant!" Tosh elbowed Gwen out of her chair and sat down at the computer.

"If I can just recalibrate the scanner to accept the new parameters…" Tosh tapped a ton of keys then banged her fist on the desk in frustration. "Damn."

"What?"

"There's a secondary shield on the grounds."

"So?"

"I picked up the signal from the SUV that Ianto took; it's parked just inside the castle grounds. I'd say it's not far from the gate itself, though how it got there, I have no idea."

She tapped a few more keys and a new map appeared, showing only the specific area where Tosh and Jack had found the gate through the rose barrier. Tosh ran her hand along one part of the graph.

"See here - the barrier is rippling enough that I can get energy signals from parts of the grounds up to 100 meters past the wall, but then it just stops."

"What do you mean, it stops?"

"Just what I said. It stops." Tosh swiveled in the chair to face Gwen. "It's just like when we were looking at the barrier, only didn't know it was there. Except now we know the castle is there, and being hidden by some form of energy screen."

"And Ianto?"

"If Ianto is there, he's inside the second energy field, which is still powered up. And I can't get through it to find him."

 

Chapter Ten

 

After dinner, Ianto took advantage of his host's offer to let him wander the grounds and set about to explore the castle. With one of Tosh's scanner programs running on his PDA, he was able to locate a handful of low-level signs of Rift energy on all three of the upper floors of the castle and two strong signals coming from somewhere under the main floor, as well as one extremely confusing but strong signal in the side gardens.

He started with the smaller signals within the castle, working his way down from a beautifully-appointed library on the top level. He found that a small wooden and ivory table and two large armchairs all registered residual Rift energy as though something that had come through the Rift had come into contact with each piece of furniture at some point in the last year, though the pieces themselves appeared to be of local origin.

Ianto allowed himself time to just enjoy the smell and feel of the library. He walked along one long wall of bookshelves, lightly running his fingertips along the leather and gilt spines. Coming to the end of the wall, he ducked around the ornately-carved spiral staircase that led to the balcony. Looking up, he could see that the balcony encircled the whole room and held even more books and some interesting glass cases that Ianto really wanted to come back and explore at some point.

The next wall was pierced by several long, narrow windows and another of the masterfully-carved fireplaces. More bookshelves filled to the brim flowed around the third wall and Ianto paused, pulling out a few books to turn their pages and admire the illustrations and print work within them. Forcing himself back to his task, Ianto replaced the manuscripts and reluctantly left the library.

One of the locations of Rift energy the PDA registered was on the second floor in the bedroom Beast had assigned to Ianto, specifically the bed. Scanning the beautifully-carved bed, he noticed the energy was strongest in the fabric of the burgundy silk duvet, sheets and pillows, while the mahogany frame itself barely registered any Rift energy at all. That caused Ianto a moment of concern. He had woken up in this bed. He ran a quick check on himself, but confirmed that there was no sign of anything unusual on his person or in the tuxedo he was wearing. He thought back to the moment he had come back to consciousness. There had been a bright light pushing at his eyelids, and when he opened his eyes he'd thought for a moment that he was drowning in violet light.

Ianto ran his tongue along the back of his teeth, remembering the taste of blood. When he'd checked after Beast had left the room, there had been no sign of a scratch or cut anywhere in or on his mouth. Blood and light; those were the strongest sensations that he still retained from waking up in Beast's presence earlier in the day. He tried to think if Beast had had anything with him at the time that could have been alien technology, but couldn't remember seeing anything until the light was gone, and then there was nothing in Beast's hands. Ianto shook his head; there were puzzles within puzzles in this castle and they were all starting to make his head hurt.

None of the other furniture in the room registered Rift energy. However, from the room's balcony, he could see the run-down stone building in the garden that emitted the greatest Rift energy signal. That would be worth checking out later.

The only other sign of residual energy came from the edges of a painting that had pride of place on the wall opposite the bed. It was an enormous landscape painting of some far-off land. There were three moons hanging low in a pale green sky. A mountain range marked the horizon with yellowed snowcaps, and a purple sea filled the foreground. It was beautiful and sad, yet filled with so much love that Ianto found himself sitting on the bench at the foot of the bed for the second time that night, lost in its colors and possibilities.

From the garden, a bird called out, startling Ianto out of his trance. He knew he needed to keep his focus, but he was feeling drained from the venom, like Beast said he would. It was a deep ache in his muscles and a bone-deep weariness that he despised. He pushed off the bench and scrubbed at his face with one hand.

With the smaller Rift energy signals proving to be contact exposures rather than actual alien artifacts, Ianto decided to skip the other weak signals for the moment and concentrate on the clearer Rift energy traces, beginning with the one on the lowest level of the castle.

After a bit of hunting, Ianto found a stairway that led from the kitchen to the cellar and into a rough-hewn corridor that itself led into a series of caves below the castle. At the beginning of one tunnel, he stepped from the dirt floor onto something soft and springy. He looked down and saw that he was standing on a blue and gold carpet that looked like a match to the one in the upper levels of the castle.

Light flared around him as a dozen candelabra wielding arms swung out from the wall and their candles burst into life.

"Shit," he said, finding himself revealed after an hour of wandering in shadows.

From the other end of the hallway, he heard a crash and Beast howl as something ceramic hit stone. Ianto thought for one moment about trying to hide in one of the caves behind him, but knew he had neither the time nor enough clear knowledge of them to risk it. Instead, he tucked his PDA into a pocket and walked as calmly as possible towards the growling sounds ahead of him.

The hallway ended in a large cave that had been transformed into a living area with tapestries on the walls and more of the thick blue and gold carpet on the floor. There was a sitting area near the entrance, a desk, and set of bookshelves in one corner, forming an office area, and a deep blue curtain on the other side that was pulled back partway, revealing a tall four-poster bed that could have been the twin to the one in Ianto's room. Unlike so many things in the castle, the bedding and chairs in this space were all done in a deep forest green, making the room appear as though it was on the edge of a forest rather than deep underground.

At a table near the sleeping area, Beast was leaning over a bowl of clear liquid. A second bowl lay in pieces on the floor nearby, its murky fluid soaking into the carpet.

Ianto took another step into the room and waited to see if Beast would notice him, but he was too engrossed, or, Ianto thought, in too much pain to notice anything beyond his immediate problem.

Wondering if he was about to make a terrible mistake, Ianto approached Beast. He could see that Beast's hands, mouth, and neck were covered with open sores, blood and smoke trickling out along the edges of the wounds. He must have made a sound then, because Beast turned and growled at him.

"What are you doing here?!"

"Your hands are burned." Ianto pointed at Beast's hands, where they hovered over the bowl of water.

Beast pulled his hands away from the bowl and stumbled backward. "It is none of your concern. Leave me."

"What happened?"

"Nothing!" Beast continued to back away from Ianto. He fell against the side of the bed moaning as he used his hands to steady himself. Ianto went to his side, gripping Beast's upper arms to help take the weight off his hands. Beast pulled away, a look of terror on his face.

"Why are you here?"

"You told me I had the freedom the castle. I was exploring…" Ianto skipped over the technical and possibly threatening bits of his search. "I found the caves and saw you here…you looked like you were in pain."

"So you came here to gawk at the monster," Beast hissed at Ianto.

"No. I came in here to see if there was anything I could do to help you."

Beast stopped hissing and visibly relaxed. "Thank you."

"It will be easier if I wash those cuts," Ianto said, reaching for the bowl on the table. Beast sprang forward and pushed him away.

"Don't touch that!"

Ianto raised his hands, willing to back away, but he didn't understand. His confusion must have shown on his face because Beast tried to explain his actions.

"It will harm your skin."

"The water?"

"A combination of acidic liquids that can counter my skin's reaction."

"The acids will heal your skin?" Ianto asked, leaning closer to Beast to look into the bowl, but keeping his hands down and away from the liquid. "Doesn't that hurt?"

"Yes," Beast sighed. "But nothing else will stop the sores from spreading. One pain to stop another."

"Not all acids are harmful to human skin," Ianto pointed out.

"This would be. The combination is highly corrosive to all exposed carbon life and can only be contained in glazed ceramic. Everything else rusts or pits within an hour of exposure." Beast shook his head. "No, such liquid would cause you pain and blistering… more, if you are exposed to it long enough. I can imagine, but I… I do not know exactly... I have been told that it is like ice burning on human skin."

"But it will help heal your wounds?"

Beast nodded.

Ianto looked at the bowl and then back at Beast. "Then I'll take my chances."

He took a calming breath and pushed away visions of his own hands blistering and bleeding. If helping Beast would make him trust Ianto enough to heal Jack, then that was worth a little pain.

He picked up a cloth from a pile farther down on the table and dipped it in the liquid. The first contact with the liquid was anticlimactic. It felt only wet and cool. As he removed the cloth and wrung it free of excess liquid, he began to feel flashes of cold along his fingertips and the surface of his palms. He fought down the instinct to wince in pain, brought the cloth Beast's hands, and began to wipe away the clotting scabs from the first one.

Beast closed his eyes and sighed with relief as the wounds stopped smoking. Ianto rinsed the cloth out and repeated the procedure on the other hand. With each dip of the cloth into the liquid, the burning cold on his skin increased and he had to work harder to keep from showing how much it was starting to hurt.

Ianto pressed the wet cloth to Beast's cheek one final time, wiping away the last of the blood and smoke, then dropped the cloth into the bowl with a sigh of his own.

Beast opened his eyes and Ianto saw peace within them. "Thank you," Beast sighed. "There is fresh water on the desk; if you wash your hands quickly it should help ease the pain."

Ianto nodded, feeling dangerously tired, and stumbled to the office area. On the desk, as Beast had said, there was a pitcher of water standing inside another large bowl. He gingerly picked up the pitcher and poured the water over first one hand and then the other, sighing much as Beast had as the acids washed off his hands. He repeated the process until all the water in the pitcher was gone and his skin felt almost warm and normal again. When he was done, he put the pitcher aside and turned to see Beast standing behind him holding out a clean towel. Ianto nodded his thanks and dried his hands. The water had helped, but he knew he was in for a day or two of pain when the cloth of the towels that felt soft in his hands only a few minutes before now seemed like sandpaper to his abraded skin. Everything had its price.

Ianto put the towel down and nodded towards Beast's hands. "Better?"

Beast nodded. "And you?"

Ianto raised his hands, palms out. "No harm done."

"Thank you. No one has done such a thing for me in longer than I can remember."

"Do you mind if I ask… What happened? What causes your hands to burn?"

Beast dropped his head. Behind him, his tail sagged.

"As I told you, your food is not something I can eat, yet I must have nourishment. I learned long ago that I could be sustained by the flesh of animals that I caught myself. The burning is the price for such a compromise. Their flesh burns me as it transforms into the nutrients that fulfill my doomed body."

"I'm sorry."

"It was not this bad before… in the past. The mingling of the flesh was a mild discomfort at most. But lately it has been as you saw it - a full burning of my flesh that takes more of me than the nutrients can balance. Soon there will be no value to the eating."

"Things were better before? Before what?"

"Nothing," Beast said, and to Ianto it seemed as if he was trying to unspeak words that he hadn't meant to share. "Time passes; things change."

Beast walked to a cabinet tucked away near the cave's entrance and pulled open one of the lavishly-carved doors. He removed a box the size of a small laptop and four times as thick. "You must be tired after all your explorations."

Ianto nodded and followed Beast into the hallway beyond the cave's entrance. There, Beast turned back to Ianto and handed him the box. "Please accept this with my thanks for your kindness."

Beast stepped past Ianto and into his room. Ianto heard a rumble from behind him and turned. Where there had been an open archway leading into Beast's chambers, there was now a seemingly impassable stone wall. Ianto raised his eyebrows in surprise, but decided that, as tired as he was, taking the hint and going to bed must certainly be the better part of valor.

Ianto looked at the box in his hands. It was made of a polished purple wood and had a crystal lid through which he could see row after row of gem-studded cufflinks winking in the candle light. Beast had just given him a prince's fortune in precious stones and gold.

 

Chapter Eleven

 

"Sit back, Jack, and be still, or I will kick them all out!" Owen said, pushing Jack back into the pillows for a second time. Really, Owen thought, the man had the patience of a gnat and was going to get himself killed from boredom. Which wouldn't be so bad if he would actually do his normal dying-and-healing trick. Owen sighed and stepped back, arms across his chest, assuming his best glaring-at-the-recalcitrant-patient look.

"Fine!" Jack said with a huff. "Go on, Avenant."

Avenant looked at Owen, who tipped his head just enough to let the UNIT officer know he could continue his report. Over Avenant's shoulder, Gwen and Tosh hid matching grins behind their hands.

"Um… all right…" Avenant cleared his throat. "As I was saying, the first barrier continues to grow weaker. Every test we've run on it shows increasing numbers of cracks and gaps in the shielding. We…. um… UNIT has also been receiving an increased number of calls reporting odd sightings from that area. Everything from ghosts of Templar Knights appearing and disappearing to glass bubbles with sparkling fairies inside them."

"Sounds like fun," Jack joked.

"I'll get you a reservation," Owen grumbled.

"What about this new inner barrier?" Gwen asked.

Tosh took over from Avenant. She tapped a couple of keys on her laptop and the monitor on the wall next to Jack's bed flickered to life. Owen turned to watch as images began to appear on the screen.

"I've managed to pinpoint where the barrier is and estimate its total volume and relative thickness based on what we know of the first barrier and the information I gathered while I was opening it when we were out there."

"Which tells us what?" Gwen prompted before Jack could.

"Our estimate is that the grounds are roughly 100 square meters in area," Avenant said, pointing to the shifting images on the screen. "Also, the castle itself is not exactly at the center. The center of the field appears to be focused around one of smaller outbuildings on the side of the castle. There are also extensive natural areas, possibly formal gardens, or just semi-wild forest land, though that part isn't as easy to distinguish."

"This point has the highest concentration of energy readings," Tosh said, and the image on the screen zoomed in to show a roughly circular image inside the energy field. "There is definitely something there, but I can't tell you what it is, exactly. Its energy is a perfect match for both barriers, so I would guess that it's related in some way."

"Okay. So what's next?" Jack pressed his head back in the pillows and closed his eyes. Owen walked over to his side and touched his skin, it was getting cold again, and his face was going gray under his eyes. A little longer and he was calling this meeting over, no matter what Jack wanted.

Jack opened his eyes and looked up at Owen. The blue eyes were shadowed, but a ghost of a smile appeared a moment later before he turned to the others. "How do we get Ianto back and the alien out of our hair?"

"And you better," Tosh added for all of them.

"Sure."

"I wonder…" Avenant began, and then stopped.

"What?" Gwen asked.

"Well, UNIT found this alien artifact a while back that we have been experimenting with. It has some unique abilities. We're not really sure what the mechanism is yet, but it allows one to see what one is looking for."

"Sounds like a magic mirror," Gwen joked, her brown eyes wide with wonder.

Avenant laughed. "Actually, that is exactly what some of us have been calling it. I just thought… with the barrier being so strong - if you wanted, I could see if it's available. And if so, let you try it."

"Is it safe?" Owen asked.

"So far," Avenant shrugged. "At least, no one has had any problems with the thing other than a little shortness of breath, like we'd gone for a strenuous walk, but no residual radiation or anything of that nature."

"Worth a try," Jack said with a nod.

"Okay. I will be right back."

As Avenant left the room, Owen took the opportunity to check Jack's pulse and IV drip.

"I'm fine, Owen," Jack said quietly.

"Sure you are. You are the picture of health and vitality. Now shut up and let me do my job."

Jack rolled his eyes at Owen but said nothing else, which either meant he was feeling as bad as he looked or learning at long last to let Owen do his job. Owen was betting on the former.

"Jack," Gwen started, then stopped, gnawing on her lower lip.

"Go on… say it."

"Maybe… maybe we should do this another time? Or Tosh and I could finish up in the other room and let you sleep?"

"No," Jack said forcefully. "Ianto is mine… my responsibility. I have to find him."

"At what cost?" Tosh asked, a worried look on her face.

"It's a mirror. How hard can it be?" Jack replied with a laugh.

"We're in luck!" Avenant said, breaking the tension in the room. "The artifact was just next door in Research. They said that since it's for Torchwood, you can use it for as long as you need it. They do want it back though," he teased as he handed the crystal cube over to Owen for examination.

Owen took the crystal from Avenant and turned it over in his hands. It was about the size of Gwen's hand with a hint of sun-yellow iridescence to it. On one side there was a raised relief image of an oval frame that could, with a little imagination, be called a mirror. On another side, there was a single button.

Owen took the cube to the work table and placed it on the scanner, running it through a selection of tests and looking for anything that might cause additional harm to Jack or hurt anyone on the team. It wasn't that Owen didn't think UNIT wouldn't have already run their own tests; he just didn't trust their tests. Well, actually, he didn't trust anyone's tests other than his own, and maybe Tosh's.

"It appears safe enough," Owen said when he'd run out of excuses and things to look for. He walked the cube over to Jack and dropped it into his outstretched hand. "But I will be monitoring you just in case."

"Fine." Turning to Avenant, Jack asked, "So what do I do?"

Avenant came to stand on the other side of Jack's bed. "Hold the cube in your hand. Push that button on the side there."

Jack adjusted the cube in his hand.

"Now just think about Ianto. Think about wanting to know where he is now, and he should appear in the screen."

Jack pushed the button. Pale yellow light, like a warm summer day, filled the room. There were several gasps as a holographic video monitor appeared in the air about a meter in front of the cube. It hovered over the bed, flickering with intense yellow light. Slowly an image of Ianto appeared in the screen.

"He's alive," Jack said, with a deep sigh of relief.

Owen stepped closer to Jack's side and looked at the image in the hologram. Ianto was dressed in a tuxedo that he'd never seen, facing what must have been the alien, given the cat-like features and medieval garb like Tosh and Jack had described. The two were in a chamber filled with candlelight and tapestries. Behind Ianto, Owen could see a row of bookcases and a desk, and just over the alien's shoulder he could make out the end of a very elegantly-carved four-poster bed.

"It looks like the alien's hands are burning," Owen mused.

"They're somewhere inside the castle," Jack said around a long, shuddering breath. "At least, that's what it looks like."

"Is he all right?" Gwen asked.

"I think so…" Owen heard a rattling sound that he didn't like creep into Jack's breathing.

"Jack…" Owen said warningly.

"He looks upset. Are they arguing?" Jack whispered through blue-tinged lips. He dropped the cube, gasping for breath. The yellow light vanished.

"Jack! What's wrong?" Gwen cried.

Jack's eyes rolled back in his head and he arched off the bead, his body struggling for air.

"Shit." Owen pushed Jack firmly back towards the bed. "Avenant, hold him!"

Avenant grabbed at Jack's shoulders and took over restraining him while Owen checked Jack's vitals.

"Damnit!"

"Owen! What is it? What's wrong?" Gwen asked.

"He's having a bloody asthma attack."

"Asthma? But Jack doesn't.."

"I know!" Owen cut her off while grabbing an oxygen feed and setting it up along side Jack's bed. "Tosh, get me a nebulizer treatment - a terbutaline - ipratropium mix. Both are in the drawer behind you!"

Owen turned back to Jack, pulling the oxygen rebreather mask more firmly over Jack's mouth and nose. "Come on, Jack…"

"Here!" Tosh handed Owen the nebulizer then helped Gwen spread an extra blanket over Jack's shivering form. Owen nodded at the ladies, grateful that Gwen had thought to deal with the heat loss. This was all just wrong.

Owen stepped back and looked over at the monitors. Jack's blood oxygen saturation levels were rising and his temperature was leveling out to something almost safe. Owen ran a hand across the back of his neck and sighed. That was too damn close.

"Damnit, Avenant!" Owen unleashed his frustration on the other man. "There's more to that thing than just looking into a simple mirror!"

"I am sorry! I did not know. No one else got ill using it."

"I'd bet no one else who used it was injured when they tried it, where they?" Gwen asked.

"No." Avenant shook his head.

"You're right. You're right, Gwen." Owen said, forcing himself to calm down and think rationally. "That was too close. With the alien DNA attacking his system and changing how he reacts to things, I just don't know what will happen if he di…" He looked over at Avenant and adjusted his wording. "…doesn't stop pushing, we might lose him for good."

Owen looked at Jack. His eyes were open again; that was a good sign, at least. "You need to rest, Jack. No more meetings. No more trying to help from a sick bed. We will take care of things from here."

Jack nodded weakly. "You'll get Ianto?"

"Yes, Jack," Gwen said, patting Jack on the shoulder. "Now that we are sure of where he is, we will go and get Ianto back."

"We promise," Tosh added before Owen ordered them all out of the room and dimmed the lights so Jack could sleep, and maybe, just maybe, heal.


	3. Part Three - The Horse

Part Three ~ the Horse

 

Chapter Twelve

 

Ianto climbed a flight of stone stairs and stepped out on to the rampart that encircled the third story of the castle. Walking to the wall's edge, he looked down between two bulky crenellations and out over the countryside. From this vantage point, he could see out across the whole of the castle grounds to the fractured green shimmer that was the rose barrier wall and beyond to the hills surrounding Perigueux. He wondered if the view of the town were new or if Beast had always been able to watch humanity coming and going around his hidden home. Had he watched the town grow from a way station for Crusaders into a bedroom village of the Renaissance? Had he watched them build Saint-Front Cathedral, perhaps wandered the construction site late at night to touch the gargoyles and flying buttresses up close? Ianto thought he might have done so if their places had been reversed and he had gotten to see history blossom all around him. But would you know it was history while it was happening? He shook his head, laughing at himself. History was what happened after everything was said and done. History had very little to do with his life, except where it touched Jack, but that was a different story.

Ianto leaned out over the edge of the wall, the rough stone scraping his raw palms, trying to see down along the outside edge. He felt like a kid checking up on the grownups at Christmas and just barely managed to resist the urge to kick his feet against the stones. Ivy crawled up the walls, making everything look like it was moving when the wind ruffled the green leaves. But nothing else moved down below on the second level rampart or in the side garden. He pushed himself up and away from the wall, dusting off his new suit with a practiced hand.

He let his feet take him along the length of the rampart, feeling the morning sun on his face and catching the hint of sweet flowers wafting up to him from somewhere below and to his left.

When he'd opened the wardrobe this morning it had been filled entirely with suits instead of the original mélange of clothes from across time. Out of the thirteen suits, he'd chosen a gray-on-gray pinstripe that looked like it was from the 1920s but fit as though it had been made for him only this week. Along with the suits, there had been sixteen pairs of shoes. The three he'd slipped his feet into had fit perfectly, so he felt safe in assuming the rest, like the suits, would fit as though tailored for him. It made him wonder if someone, one of the animated arms perhaps, had snuck into his room in the middle of the night and taken measurements. Maybe Beast had a fantasy father who was a tailor stashed away like Ianto did, one that he could send out to make magical clothes and shoes for all his guests. Ianto rolled his eyes at himself then ran a hand along the silk-blend fabric of the suit. Sunlight flashed off the diamond and gold cufflink at his wrist. Everything was exquisite. And very odd. All of his past alien encounters had included slime and pain and running, lots and lots of running. But here he was with a wardrobe of expensive suits looking for Rift signatures in a castle that had been hidden away for half a millennia.

He took his PDA out of a pocket and pulled up the search program. He'd planned to look into the other small Rift signals this morning, but the temptation of the views from the battlements had been too much to resist. He'd decided to double check his readings before continuing on with his search of the grounds.

Rounding the corner, Ianto found Beast leaning against the rampart wall, watching him. In the sunlight, Ianto could see a hint of light gray striping in Beast's fur, particularly around his eyes and mouth. Somehow it made him appear less ferocious, more like a house cat, a really large house cat. Though as he moved his hands and the sunlight glistened along his scaled fingers, Ianto knew that nothing would make Beast seem less alien.

"Good morning." Beast bowed from the waist as Ianto stopped before him, his deep blue tunic flowing out gracefully around him as he moved.

Ianto's mouth quirked. It was more than a little odd to have someone bowing to him. He nodded his head in return. "Good morning."

"How are your hands?"

"Only a little sore this morning, thank you."

"I am glad."

Ianto looked over Beast's face and pointed to his hands. "There's no sign of the wounds."

Beast looked down, turning his hands over and showing the soft pink pads to Ianto. "No. The cleanser takes all away with it as it heals."

Ianto nodded, then looked down when his PDA vibrated in his hand. He tapped the screen with his stylus to save the new data from the search.

"What is it you see in that small box that interests you so much?"

Ianto turned looked up at Beast, then back at his PDA. He reset the search parameters to scan Beast himself while they talked then looked back up. "I'm scanning the grounds," he lied, more of an exaggerated omission really. "Recording the locations and patterns of non-terrestrial energy."

"Non-terrestrial energy?"

"Energy signatures from devices not made here on earth or not powered by energy sources normally found here on earth."

Beast frowned. "You cannot leave, so why does it matter what is here?"

"I still have a job to do. And what I find while I'm here might prove useful to others. Perhaps even to you."

"How is that possible? "

Ianto looked at Beast, thinking about how best to explain his point.

"You told me last night that you used to be able to metabolize the flesh of the animals you killed," he began, and saw Beast flinched at his words, "…with less damage to yourself. If I can determine what has changed here on the grounds, or even within your cellular structure, I might be able to help you find a new food source that would serve you better and with less discomfort."

"You would do that?"

"Yes, we would," Ianto stressed the "we", figuring it was time to try to again.

"We?"

"Jack, the man who you… met before, who I work for, and the rest of our team."

Beast walked a little way away to stand beside one of the open sections of crenellation. He put his hand on the upright edge and looked out. "You trust him."

"With my life," Ianto said simply.

"Yet he invaded my home and stole from me," Beast growled, whirling on Ianto.

Ianto took a deep breath and stood his ground.

"Our job is to protect people. Sometimes we do that by exploring things that are unusual so that we can determine if they present risks to people who live in the area. This place wasn't here, at least as far as we knew, a few days ago, so we were sent to investigate."

Beast paced away from Ianto, clenching his fists in his belt.

"There have been problems," Beast said at last. "That which ensures the safety and invisibility of this place has weakened."

"What happened?" Ianto asked quietly.

"Several weeks ago someone… came to visit. Someone I once knew. They spoke words that I should not have trusted. We fought and I was injured. When I woke the next morning a power source was gone. They must have discovered where it had been hidden while I was recovering."

"A power source?"

"Yes. It is the second one that has gone missing."

"When did the first one disappear?"

"Nearly eighty years ago. "

"And this most recent disappearance happened shortly before the barrier shield began to fail?"

Beast turned back to Ianto, surprise in his eyes. "Yes, how did you know?"

"That's when UNIT first noticed activity in this area." Ianto thought about the possible dangers of alien power sources being out in the world. It was one of the things on Torchwood's "do not want" list. "Beast, what are the power sources? What do they look like?"

Beast shook his head. "No. I cannot tell you that."

"Please, I need to know. If they are outside the castle grounds I need to know. I have to tell Jack!"

"No!" Beast shouted backing away from Ianto. "You may trust him with your life, Ianto Jones, but I know only evil of him!"

Beast turned and walked quickly down the length of the rampart and into the tower at the far end. Ianto called after him, but Beast never stopped.

 

Chapter Thirteen

 

Rose petals littered the ground under Gwen's feet as she walked around Ianto's abandoned SUV. There were no tire tracks or signs that the car had been driven to its location. In fact, it was resting directly in a pool of water, yet when she knelt down to run her hand along the tire nearest her, it came away dry. And there was a distinct lack of mud in any of the SUV's tires, even the spare on the back.

She rubbed her hands on her jeans and stood up. She raised her face to the sun and closed her eyes, grinning like a kid into the warmth. There were only a few clouds in the pale blue sky. There was the smell of fresh cut grass on the breeze and the air was the perfect temperature. Maybe if she asked very nicely, Jack would let them come to France on vacation more often. Of course they would have to find a way to keep it a vacation instead of work and people going missing, but she'd figure that part out later.

She hugged the warmth to herself and opened her eyes. She had a mystery to discuss.

"No sign of struggle," Gwen said, looking into the driver's side of the car. "No scuff or drag marks. Keys are gone from the ignition. And the parking brake's on as usual." She chuckled.

"What is funny about that?" Avenant asked, looking up from his exploration of the ground around the back end of the vehicle.

Gwen shook her head fondly. "Ianto's about the only one of us who ever remembers to put the brake on. And he does it all the time. Drives Owen starkers!"

"I think he does it on purpose," Tosh added with a grin.

"Ah." Avenant nodded, looking like he understood, but Gwen suspected he didn't quite get the joke. It was nice of him to try, though, at least for Tosh's sake. "He did seem quite thorough."

Both women laughed. "Yeah, that's a word for him."

"So if he parked the car himself," Gwen said, thinking through their present puzzle, "presumably near where we did, since there are too many trees to drive over from the road. How did the car get here?" She waved her hands at the puddle of water.

They all looked at each other, confusion clear on each face. Gwen watched in concern as Tosh pulled her coat tight around her slim shoulders and stared at the SUV. They needed a focus.

"Right. Let's see how far we can get." Gwen figured that walking to a castle was better than standing around looking perplexed, and they already knew that was where Jack had seen Ianto in that damn mirror.

Gwen tugged on the knot holding her sweater around her waist and turned towards the castle. She felt Tosh and Avenant slide into step behind her on the drive.

Overhead and on either side were the enormous oak and ash trees that Tosh had told her about so avidly on the drive out here. She could almost imagine traveling in a coach-and-four along this road, heading up to the castle to attend a ball or some such event. She'd be Cinderella in her magical dress and Rhys could be her Prince Charming waiting to try her glass slipper on her overly-wide foot. She giggled at the image of Rhys getting down on his knees without falling over, dressed in a fancy powered wig and old-fashioned coat. She'd have to help him up after, of course, but it might be worth it for the celebration at the end of the night.

A large black bird flew past them, sweeping down and nearly touching Avenant with its claws as it went past. It flew up and around them in a circle then off again over the castle wall, calling out to them with a loud caw caw!

Avenant, when she looked back, was staring up at the bird like he'd seen a ghost or something. His normally pale face was nearly white and his hands were clenched at his sides. She reached out to him.

"Are you all right, Avenant?"

He started as she put her hand on his arm then looked at her with a careful smile. "Yes, of course."

She looked into his eyes and watched them shift from storm gray to emerald green. He gripped her hand and it was strong and firm; whatever terror he had been seeing was gone.

Gwen nodded. "Okay. Just, let me know if you see or feel anything odd, yeah?"

"Of course," he said with a semblance of his charming smile.

She let go of his hand and started walking again, checking the sides of the drive for any sign of life, alien or otherwise. She was a few steps ahead of the others when Tosh called out.

"Gwen, stop!"

She stopped immediately and turned to Tosh, waiting to hear what had changed around them.

"The second barrier wall," Tosh said. "Its energy pattern just spiked off the scale right in front of us. I don't think… I'm not sure it's safe to go through."

"Oh. Thanks."

Tosh bobbed her head in a nod.

Avenant picked up a stick and threw it at the space in front of them. It hit clear air and hung suspended for a moment, then flared with blue sparks before falling to the ground as a pile of ash.

"Right," Gwen said.

"That is a problem," Avenant said, kneeling to poke at the pile of ash with a stick.

"Tosh," Gwen asked, looking around at the trees and drive for some sign of the barrier that was stopping them. "If there's a second barrier wall, how did you and Jack get to the castle the other day?"

"I'm not sure… It's possible that the second wall wasn't as strong. Or, it might not have been up at all." Tosh tapped a few keys on her scanner. "From these readings, I'd say the second wall is relatively new. Or if it was there at all, it wasn't fully active until the first wall went down."

"So what caused the first wall to go down?" Avenant asked.

"I know it was active when Jack and I first arrived. I had to try several different combinations to find a code that would trigger the release mechanism on the gate. But now the gate is just a physical barrier, no codes required."

"Did you need a code to get back out?" Gwen asked.

Tosh thought about it for a moment then slowly shook her head. "No."

"So something happened while you and Jack were here. Damn, I wish he could tell us what happened between him and the alien!"

Gwen paced away from the pile of ash, kicking the ground in frustration, then stopped as her foot nearly stepped on a rose. It was in the middle of the path where there were no other roses. She knelt down and touched its silky pink petals. Its leaves were the most vibrant shade of green that she had ever seen on a rose, nearly the color of Avenant's eyes, and its center was filled with rich black stamens. As she picked up the flower, she noticed that there was a note tied to its stem and that the stem had been cut clean from its cane rather than broken off or torn.

The note was short and clearly handwritten on a scrap of soft cream-colored fabric that she guessed might have been linen or silk. Given the rusty color of the letters in the note, she had a terrible feeling that it had been written in blood.

The note read:

J –  
2 power sources missing. Stolen?  
80 yrs &amp; 4wks ago  
Alien dying?  
\- I

"Ianto's still alive!" Gwen shouted. She stood up and turned back to the others, holding out the rose to Tosh, who took it from her with impatient hands.

"The fabric feels like silk and old," Tosh said, running it through her fingers.

"He wrote the message in blood," Gwen added, tugging her jumper from around her waist and pulling it on to fight a chill that had nothing to do with the air around her.

"Probably figured it was the only way to get it past the barrier. The silk isn't from any shirt I've seen him wear. These must all be things from inside the castle grounds… well, and Ianto himself."

"Smart," Avenant said. "Very smart."

"That's our Ianto," Tosh smiled.

Gwen nodded over her shoulder towards the SUV. "Let's get this back and see if we can track down the power sources he mentioned."

~~~~~~

Hidden from view on the other side of the barrier, Ianto stood watching his teammates as they turned and walked back towards the rose wall and their waiting SUV. He hoped they would understand his message, and that Beast would understand why he had to send it with them.

 

Chapter Fourteen

 

Beast approached the dining hall slowly, one hand along the wall for support. He'd changed for dinner, putting on his finest tunic, a rich red tonight, its yolk heavily embroidered with gold thread and gemstones. He'd hoped the change of clothes would help him feel more in control of his situation. It only added weight to his confusion and did nothing for the bone-deep exhaustion that seemed to be his constant companion these days.

He rubbed at the pain behind his left ear. It had begun last night as a dull ache and now felt as though it wanted to split his skull into large, clearly defined pieces. Even if he could have eaten cooked human food, the very thought of any of it would have made him ill.

He could have excused himself from dinner, he supposed, but it had been so long since he had anyone to talk with and this young man was intriguing. He was a mix of so many worlds. And he did not shy away from who and what Beast was, and that was a rare commodity in Beast's life. This was something he needed now more than ever as so much of his life was falling apart.

Beast leaned his head against the rough texture of a tapestry and gave in to tears. He hurt in body and soul. And he was so tired of hurting and wanting and he just needed this nightmare to be over one way or another, even if that meant he died here on this planet and never saw the stars again.

The clock in the dining hall chimed seven-thirty. He was late.

He took a deep breath and pushed himself away from the wall. He dragged a sleeve across his damp face and straightened his tunic. He would make the most of the time he had before him. He had company and conversation and that was all that mattered in this moment.

Stepping into the dining hall, Beast was pleased to see that Ianto was still there and that he had not yet sat down to dinner. In fact, the other man was engaged in some kind of staring contest with one of the carvings in the fireplace mantel. He watched Ianto crouch down, the smooth lines of his tuxedo crinkling as he moved, the glitter of the cuff links Beast had gifted him sparkling as Ianto lifted his hand towards the fireplace. Ianto slowly tilted his head and hand to one side and then swayed slowly from the outside to the inside of the fireplace. Beast chuckled when Ianto suddenly reared back, his arms windmilling for balance, and yelped softly. Ianto turned and looked at him with a disgruntled frown.

"My apologies," Beast said, coming to stand beside Ianto and pointing at the lovely catlike figure whose eyes were glowing with mischief. He had a fair idea of what she had done to surprise the reserved man into such a sound. "I too have been on the receiving end of many of her games."

Ianto coughed and looked away. "She tweaked my nose."

Beast laughed.

"I didn't even know she had hands."

"Oh, she does, trust me." Beast smiled. "She's tweaked me several times for getting too close as well." Beast nodded when Ianto looked at him as though he didn't believe him. "She's even followed me to other fireplaces. She particularly likes the one in the library. She likes to be read to."

"I'll have to remember that," Ianto said with a thoughtful look.

Beast gazed over at the undisturbed table and then back to Ianto. "You have not eaten?"

"I was waiting for you."

Beast couldn't help it; he preened like a young man on his first date. "Thank you."

Amused at his own thoughts, Beast stepped around to Ianto's chair and held it out for him. Ianto looked at him for a moment and Beast feared that he might refuse, but then he rolled his eyes, which Beast thought oddly charming, undid the button on his jacket and sat.

Beast took the seat opposite Ianto with a quiet sigh. Some tension in him had lessened; maybe the ache in his soul really was loneliness after all. If that was the case, then perhaps Ianto's Captain had done Beast a favor.

The candelabra at the center of the table poured wine for both of them and they toasted each other in companionable silence.

"Are you feeling okay?" Ianto asked.

"Hmmm? Yes. I'm fine."

"I'm sorry if I upset you this morning."

"Do not concern yourself over it." Beast tried to wave Ianto's words away with his hand.

Ianto put his glass down and leaned his arms on the table, looking intently at Beast. "It's just that we – I might be able to help. If I knew more about the power sources that disappeared, I could run a search for them, perhaps track them down for you."

"Why would you do that?"

Ianto hesitated, words gathering behind his eyes. "It's clear that you're in pain, and suffering from the loss of whatever it is they do for you. I'd like to help."

Beast reached out to adjust the place setting in front of him, and then the set of the glasses; anything to avoid looking at Ianto.

"You wished to know what the power sources are?"

"Yes."

"It has been a long time since I spoke of these things to anyone." Beast shook his head, uncomfortable with the conversation. Memories flashed across his vision and he blinked, willing them to go away. His father's hand stroking his forehead, whispering soothing words while terror ripped Beast's name and sanity away. Things he had fought to forget, yet desperately wanted to remember, beat at him. Emerald green eyes filled with pain, filled with love. Those same eyes turned glassy and dull, the woman inside gone though the body was still breathing.

His breath caught in his throat. He coughed around the pain, struggling for clarity. He looked up at Ianto, used the other man as an anchor for his words.

"The power sources are old. They were with me, with us, when we came here in the storm."

"Through the Rift?"

"Is that what you call it?"

Ianto nodded.

"Rift." Beast felt out the word, rolling the sounds into the air. He shrugged. "To us it was a storm of energy and light, of sound, emotions, pain and sensation. Everything tumbled and twisted until nothing made sense, and then everything stopped. Mother…" Visions of his mother screaming in pain seared through Beast. Hands strapping her into a chair, demanding answers that she would never give, none of them would, even if Beast had known what was being asked of him. He closed his eyes and fought against the memories. "She died."

"I'm very sorry."

Beast nodded. After a time he went on. "Father was injured, but managed to create a place of shelter for us. He used the power of our ship to build the barrier wall and hide us from the others… and the humans who lived in the area."

"Tied to the castle?"

"Yes, this place was already here when we crashed. It was old even before we arrived, and strong in its own powers and energies. There is a spring that runs under the main holy place; not our holy place, but holy nonetheless. Father used its foundations to hide our ship and anchor the inner barrier."

"And the power sources?"

Beast looked deeply at Ianto before answering, trying to decide how much he could, or already did, trust this human who sat in his hall. Did he really have a choice? It was either trust him with long-held secrets or go on living a half-life that would kill him as certainly as his secrets could.

"Crystals from our home that powered our ship," Beast said finally.

Ianto's eyes widened but he said nothing.

"Combined, their power is greatly increased, but individually, each has a power of its own."

Ianto looked puzzled. "If you had the crystals, why didn't you just go home?"

"Father hid them on the grounds so that they would be safe until repairs could be made to our ship. And… because I was ill."

Beast stood, needing to walk, to out pace the visions that he almost understood. Screams and pain. Voices that demanded, commanded, but what they wanted Beast could never remember. "Give it to us and we'll let her live!" And always the pain. Like being torn into pieces over and over again, a puzzle that does not know its own shape or solution. He closed his eyes and clenched his fists, his claws biting into the flesh of his palm.

"Something about the storm changed me. Made me the monster that you see."

"I see no monster," Ianto said, his voice startling close.

Beast shuddered and opened his eyes. Ianto was standing in front of him; this strange human man who saw so much so quickly. He hadn't heard him stand up or walk toward him. He hadn't heard anything but the voices in his head.

"And your father? Where is he?" Ianto asked, compassion in his eyes and voice.

Beast bowed his head. "Dead. He died not long after creating our home. … I often thought that the work took the last of his strength, but I was too young and too ill to help."

"So you have been alone this whole time?"

"Yes." Beast paced away then stopped and turned to Ianto. An image flashed across his thoughts. A face like his own but older, wiser. Someone he loved and craved, who held the last of his heart in his hands. He looked at the other man, surprised that he had forgotten. "No. My brother was with us for a time, but he is gone now as well."

"It must be hard to be alone and so far from everything you know."

"My father told me that I was born off-world. And though we visited when I was young, I hardly remember what home looks like any more."

"Oh."

"And your home, Ianto?" Beast said, needing to change the subject, needing to learn more about the other man and his capacity for understanding. He waved at the table and their wine glasses. "Where is that? You do not sound like the others I have heard outside the grounds."

Ianto settled himself in his chair and took a sip of his wine before answering. "I was born in Wales. I still live there, in Cardiff."

"With your friends." Beast took his own seat and raised his glass to the candlelight, watching the colors break apart along the crystal edges.

"Yes." Ianto nodded.

"You miss them?" Beast looked across the table at Ianto. He could see the longing in the other man even as Ianto struggled to maintain his professional demeanor.

"I do," Ianto admitted. "They are like family to me."

"Like family? Do you not have a family of your own?"

Ianto paused and the hesitation was back in his eyes, the calculation of words to be spoken. "I have a sister," he said at last. "Rhiannon. She and her husband live in Cardiff as well; they have two children, Mica and David."

"And your parents?" Beast asked, surprised by the sudden stiffness in Ianto's body. At any other time he might have honored the message implied by the closed-off face, but he had shared much with this young man. He wanted to know why he had been so willing to tell Ianto about his own life, when Ianto was so unwilling to speak of his. "What of them?"

"Dead." Ianto looked down at his plate. "Like yours, though not… not through any alien means. They never even knew. Rhi doesn't know what I do. I don't think they would understand."

"You have not told your sister of this work you do? This hunting alien energy and helping the world?"

Ianto shook his head.

"What does she think you do then?"

Ianto laughed; it was not a kind laugh and Beast thought there was grief layered within the anger. "Civil Servant."

Beast looked at Ianto in confusion.

Ianto shrugged. "I told her I work for the Cardiff Tourist Council."

"And she believed you?"

"She believes everything I tell her," he said, and the anger and grief were nearly companions at the table with them now "…about myself."

"Ah." Beast nodded. When he did not pursue the matter, Ianto picked up his fork and stabbed a piece of meat on his plate. The gold flatware hit the china hard enough that Beast marveled that the plate did not shatter under Ianto's rage.

He let the young man work his way back to calm; he'd learned enough for the moment. Taking a sip of wine, he fit the pieces together like the psychologists whose work he found so fascinating to read. A lonely, isolated and misunderstood child grew up to be a man who paid attention to every detail, compartmentalizing the world so that nothing could hurt him. The isolation of his youth pushed him to be independent and cope with the ways in which he saw the world differently from others, his family in particular. He wondered how much older this Jack was than Ianto, and what he was to Ianto, beyond his employer. An older lover would be more interesting, more understandable to Ianto, and would be more likely to recognize the brilliance that lived inside his manufactured walls.

Beast took another sip of his wine and looked over at Ianto. The other man was calmer, his polite exterior knitted back into place. There were dark circles under his eyes though. Were they a result of the venom or had they been there before Beast had ever met him?

"My apologies. I did not realize that things between you and your family were so strained," Beast said, setting his glass on the table and running a finger along the rim.

"It's fine. We just don't speak much about it these days."

"Of course. And you have your… work friends."

"Torchwood, yes."

"And your Jack? What is he, when he is not stealing treasures from monsters?"

Beast's suspicions were confirmed when Ianto blushed and looked down at his hands. The other man sounded smooth and still professional, but the longing was clear enough. Ianto's scent had changed, and the timber of his voice darkened when he finally answered the question.

"Jack is our Captain," Ianto said with a cough. "He is the leader of our team. He's a good man. He watches out for all of us, loves us all in his own way, and wants us to live up to the potential he thinks he sees within us. He talks constantly and says little. He is passionate and sad and lonely and lost, but stronger than anyone I have ever met."

"He is more than your employer."

"Yes," Ianto answered without prevarication.

"There is love between you."

Ianto sighed and Beast had to wonder at the layers of meaning behind that sound. "There is… a kind of love between us, yes."

"There either is love or there is not."

"I used to think that, too, but love is more than that." He laughed softly, more to himself, it seemed. "Life is more than just life, and neither is so easy to describe." Ianto sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Beast watched him curiously, trying to understand. "We fit together. We share our lives because we choose to. He has changed me - because of this job, the work we do, and because of who he is. I never expected any of this, but it feels right."

"Have you changed him?"

"I don't know." Ianto shrugged. "I hope so. I think so."

Beast regarded Ianto for a long breath. To Beast, love was always love. It was simple and straightforward with no confusion. But Beast also suspected that after so long alone, his was still the love of an innocent, the love of a son for his parents and a brother for his sibling. There had been nothing so complex in his life as this blend of fitting together that Ianto and his Captain shared. For Ianto, that was clearly enough.

"So you ask me to trust him?"

"Yes."

Beast nodded and drank down the last of his wine. "I will think on this." Beast shoved his chair back from the table.

"Thank you for the excellent company." He bowed to Ianto. "Until later."

Beast pushed himself out of his chair, fighting his body's weakness and refusing to show Ianto how tired he truly was. Ianto might have found a way to box his secrets up and choose who and when to trust so easily and so deeply, but for Beast, after five hundred years of nightmares, hiding and secrets were all he knew. Trust was as alien to him as Beast himself was to Ianto.

 

Chapter Fifteen

 

The work room was quiet for a change. The overheads had been long since turned off, mimicking the comforting darkness of the Hub. They had all gravitated to using desk lamps, with Avenant mumbling about crazy Torchwood as he rounded up enough to fill each desk for them. Tosh smiled at the memory. He'd mumbled a few other, sweeter things to her as he set her lamp up. She felt her skin flush as she remembered the feel of his breath on her skin whispering delicious innuendos into her ear.

She dragged her thoughts back to the records she was supposed to be reviewing. On the laptop in front of her was the file of all Torchwood incident reports for France. The file was both frighteningly large and woefully lacking in the data they needed. That made it all so very easy to be distracted by the handsome Frenchman sitting beside her, his deep black hair curling in soft waves down his back from his ever present pony tail.

She shifted her head a little to look across at Avenant through the curtain of her hair. He was making notes on a piece of paper while he read over a report on the screen in front of him. He was supposed to be sorting through all of UNIT's alien incident reports for the region so they could compare notes, but given how the page on the screen was the same one he'd had up a few minutes ago, she guessed that he was having as much trouble concentrating as she was Tosh smiled, and hoped she was the source of his distraction.

He knew how to work in silence; she had to give him that. It was not the silence of one who hated being quiet and was just doing it to humor her. He seemed to genuinely understand that two people could be in a room together and speak without words.

Avenant reached for his coffee cup, his fingers brushing lightly over hers where it was resting on top of a file. She saw him smile and dipped her head, unaccountably shy, before being brave and raising her eyes to meet his. His smile widened as she looked up and she found it impossible not to respond to the warmth she saw there.

With his other hand, Avenant reached out and slowly brushed her hair out of her face and tucked the long strands behind her ear. She nearly stopped breathing as he looked at her, his eyes filled with longing. He leaned in towards her and then paused, so close to her lips.

"May I?"

She nodded, breath catching in her throat.

She watched him close his eyes before giving in to the weight of her own lids. Then he was kissing her so softly and sweetly, his lips full and soft on hers. She opened her mouth to sigh and felt his tongue trace the line of her bottom lip.

"Avenant?" Gwen called from across the room.

Tosh froze. Her eyes flew open. Damn Gwen and her horrible timing!

Avenant pulled away slowly, a soft smile on his face, then sat up straight, turning his whole body to face Gwen. Tosh realized that he was shielding her from her teammate, giving her a little time to collect herself and she blessed him for that. She didn't think she could deal with Gwen's cooing over this – whatever this might be – that was blooming between herself and Avenant. Not yet, not until it had had a little more time to grow and find the light of its own accord.

"Oh, there you are," Gwen said, striding over to Avenant. "Have you turned up anything in the UNIT records yet? We really need to know about any Rift activity for the area from for that eighty-year mark."

Avenant shook his head slowly. "Not yet; the records from back then are less than impeccable."

Gwen's shoulders slumped. "Tosh? Anything in the Torchwood files?"

"There was one thing; I was just double checking. Hang on." Tosh hit a handful of keys, sending an image to the large screen on the wall screen near her desk. They turned as one to look at the images. "There's a memo from UNIT to Torchwood London about a Rift spike in this region. It's dated 31 October 1929."

"Did London do anything about it?" Gwen asked. Tosh could see her cheering up at the thought of data to sink her teeth into.

"Doesn't seem to have." Tosh looked back at her own monitor and scrolled through a few entries before settling on a long one from the head of Torchwood One to send to the main screen. "There's some additional chatter in the notes. It seems they sent a junior agent to investigate. She came back after two weeks with a wardrobe full of new clothes, six cases of a highly regarded 1916 Chateau Latour, and a thin report noting a case of teenagers playing with pumpkins on Halloween around the location of the Rift spike."

"Bollocks."

"Wait, October 31st?" Avenant asked. "I remember something, but it didn't seem to fit the parameters of our search." He dragged the keyboard from in front of Tosh, typed a command into the system and sent information to the wall screen.

"Here it is. A UNIT report that mentions a Miss Hillary Westmore arriving on that date from London. They don't state who she was working with, though, so I didn't think anything of it at the time."

As Avenant spoke an image appeared of a scanned handwritten UNIT report, then a sepia-toned photo stamped with the words "Property of UNIT" showing a young woman in a modified uniform jacket and skirt. A final image appeared on the screen of a handwritten note from the UNIT Medical Officer's desk.

"Well, we have it now." Gwen leaned in to look more closely at the screen. "Here's note from the medical officer's office." Gwen stepped over to the door leading to the medical suite and shouted, "Owen!"

A moment later Owen strode through the door looking annoyed. "Can't a person get some sleep around here?"

"You can sleep later like the rest of us." Gwen waved Owen over to the screen. "Come look at this. Can you read it for us? It looks like a medical report."

"My French is rusty as fuck, but I'll give a go." Owen stepped over to the computer screen and leaned in. He mumbled to himself a bit then nodded. "Seems someone name of Miss Westmore went out to, um… investigate a sighting," Owen looked over at Tosh and Avenant. "Is this about that missing power source Ianto mentioned?"

Tosh nodded. "We think so, yes. A Hillary Westmore from Torchwood saw or found something around here about eighty years ago. "

Owen bobbed his head and turned back to the medical report. "Well, it looks like while she was out investigating the lady slipped, I think. Or maybe fell. Either way she hit her head. When she came to she was talking about a …" Owen squinted at the screen. "Avenant, can you make that out? Chev… cheval…?"

Avenant stepped up to the screen. "Yes, I believe so. Cheval. Horse."

"Cristal... … A crystal horse?"

"Ah… crystal as in clear white perhaps?" Avenant offered.

Owen snorted. "… and shot fire."

"Sounds like quite a concussion," Avenant said.

"Funny thing is," Owen continued over Avenant. "It goes on to say that the attending physician treated her for burns to her cheek and upper arm, but there was no blistering or bleeding in the wound track. It was cauterized clean."

Gwen looked back at the screen and then slowly pivoted on her heel, looking at each of them in turn. Tosh could see a myriad of thoughts working their way through Gwen's eyes. Finally, she turned back to Avenant. "Did anyone go with her to the site?"

Avenant tapped several keys, scrolling through the report, then settling on one page and leaving it up on the screen. "A UNIT officer was sent as her liaison. The report says she ordered him to stay with the car, so he never saw a thing."

"How convenient."

"What are you thinking?" Tosh asked, watching Gwen tap a finger against her bottom lip.

"Did she fall? Or was she pushed?" Gwen asked, answering, as she often did, a question with yet more questions. "We've all seen weapons which shoot fire and can cauterize wounds, only we call them lasers nowadays. So who's to say Hillary didn't find something important out near the castle and nearly lose her life over the information?"

"Oh, it's Hillary now, is it?"

"Stuff it, Owen, you know what I mean."

"Yeah, I do." He folded his arms across his chest. "Okay, say she did find something. Where did it go?"

"And why did she get sent home after a shopping trip?" Avenant asked.

"To make her look like a useless woman," Tosh said heatedly. "It would be easy to dismiss a flighty woman's report if all she did was spend company time shopping and larking about. Bury the evidence and retcon the operative so even she didn't remember what happened. Then she would have spent the rest of her life thinking she was a failure or just plain stupid." Tosh shivered. "We need to find that weapon."

"Agreed." Gwen looked at her with a knowing grimace and nodded. Then she turned to Owen, her hands gripped in the air. "Tell me some good news please, Owen. How's Jack?"

"Sorry." Owen shook his head. "No improvement. He's breathing on his own but it is way too shallow and his core body temperature hasn't risen above 88 degrees all day."

"That's bad, right?"

"Yeah."

"So what do we do now?" Tosh asked.

They stared at each other for a moment then Gwen shook herself. "Tosh, try analyzing the note Ianto left us. Maybe there's something in the fabric that we can use."

"Like what?" Avenant asked.

"I don't know, but we have to try something."

"Okay." Tosh picked up the note that she had separated from the rose earlier. "The silk is very old, but in excellent condition. That should tell us something."

"Anything you can find out, Tosh."

Avenant reached over for the rose. "Huh. I had not seen this before, out by the castle. But this rose is also very old and very rare." He looked up at Gwen. "Not the flower itself, but the variety."

"It's a Rosa gallica officinalis," Owen said, taking the rose from Avenant and twirling it between two fingers. "Old certainly, but not all that rare, not around here at least. It's practically native to France."

"It is a Rosa gallica, yes." Avenant took the rose back to twirl it in his own fingers. "But not an officinalis. This is Rosa gallica decur."

"No such rose," Owen scoffed.

Avenant nodded his head and Tosh hid a smile. Avenant had finally found something he knew more about than Owen did, which was a rare enough occurrence for most of the men in UNIT. Owen was a brilliant doctor and about as arrogant as they came. The combination made it very hard to get one over on him.

"It is as its name implies: tres belle. Beautiful. It grows only here in this part of the Aquitaine. Specifically here in the hills above Perigueux, and has never successfully been cultivated anywhere else in the world." Avenant presented the rose to Owen with a flourish.

"Huh." Owen placed the rose on the scanner next to him. He typed a series of commands into the computer, muttering the whole time.

"How do you know so much about this rose, Avenant?" Gwen asked as they watched Owen work.

"A friend of mine kept a rose garden filled with the most beautiful roses. I used to help her after school and she would tell me stories about the different roses, where they came from and how they got their names." Avenant smiled and Tosh could not help but smile with him.

"Her favorite was the decur, she said, because it was named for a maiden known only as Belle. She was supposed to have been the daughter of a French nobleman whose family had won the rights to an old Crusader's chateau during the Hundred Years War. One night, after a terrible storm, Belle and the chateau vanished. In its place was a wall of roses no one had ever seen before. Its petals were as pink as Belle's lips, its leaves as green as her emerald eyes, and its center, midnight black like her hair."

"That wouldn't be the same castle that just reappeared, would it?" Owen asked, looking up from his machines.

"The very same."

"So a rose that appears starting around the turn of the sixteenth century just as a whole castle goes missing... sounds like aliens to me."

"The timeline also fits with the silk Ianto used," Tosh said, handing the fabric to Gwen. "It was definitely made in the late 14th century, no earlier than 1505 or so. And there are signs of extraterrestrial fibers woven into the fabric as well."

"What?!"

"See, look at this." Tosh sent a close-up image of the note to the wall screen. "These fibers have been treated with a chemical marker not found here on earth. There's no way this is human."

"Well then, we are three for three," Owen said, coming to stand next to Gwen, the rose in his hand. "Avenant was right. This is not officianalis. And it's not purely terrestrial either. The molecular structure has been altered, changing the genetic sequencing for color, scent, and size, not just of the petals but of the leaves as well. It's a wonder earth bees can recognize this thing to pollinate it!"

Owen reached across Tosh's lap to tap on her keyboard, sending two more images to the screen.

"There's a problem though." The new images were of two roses, similar to the one in Owen's hand, each one fuller and more vibrant than what Owen was waving around. "The one on the right is what the decur should look like."

"Should?" Avenant asked.

"Yep. That is regional champion photographed two months ago."

"It looks like something out of my friend's garden. No wonder I didn't recognize the rose we found near the castle."

"Exactly. The image on the left is a specimen from 85 years ago."

"Oh my," Gwen gasped, then looked from the screen to the pale imitation of a rose in Owen's hand and back to the screen. "So what does this mean?"

Owen used the rose in his hand to point at the rose on the screen. "The roses are just an outward sign of a larger problem. Tea-Boy and Jack were both right. Our alien is sick, probably even dying, if the rate of deterioration in the rose stock is anything to go by."

"Can you figure out what's causing the decline in the roses?" Gwen asked.

"It'll depend on how well the local floriculturists have kept their records."

"I'll give you a hand with that if you'd like." Avenant offered.

Owen nodded, already walking back to the scanner.

"Owen?" Tosh called softly.

Owen turned back to look at her.

"If you figure out what's wrong with the rose, will it help you find a cure for Jack?"

"I don't know." Owen shook his head. "I don't know."


	4. Part Four - The Glove

Part Four ~ the Glove

 

Chapter Sixteen

 

Ianto reached up with one hand and undid the top button of his shirt and pushed the stiff fabric open alongside the ends of his bow tie. He'd long since abandoned the tux jacket to the wooden valet in the bedroom and the night air was refreshingly cool after the warmth of the candle- and fire-lit dining hall.

He hitched his hip up onto the balcony's balustrade and leaned back against the door jam. With the fingers of one hand, he teased at the crease in the fine wool of his black slacks. In his other hand, he held a crystal glass of water. He desperately wished he dared fill it with something stronger, but the wine he'd had with dinner was pushing his luck while he was technically still on duty.

The more he thought about the things he told Beast at dinner, the more he wondered which of them had learned the most. In point of fact, it seemed more like he'd stumbled upon a deeper understanding about himself and his relationship with Jack than anything new about the alien. He'd managed to put words to the jumble of thoughts and feelings he'd been struggling to define for a while now. Something about how Beast had asked his questions had triggered a flood of information that made everything in his head make sense for once. It was nothing like what he had expected a relationship should be, but, like he had said to Beast, it worked for him and it appeared to work for Jack. In the end, wasn't that all that mattered?

A bird called out across the garden and Ianto leaned out into the darkness, searching for the source. From the far side of the pool, a peacock, startlingly white in the moonlight, strutted about, paying court to a dark green peahen. The bird preened, his enormous tail standing tall and proud. Ianto smiled and imagined Jack as the peacock showing off for anyone who would pay attention. Maybe he should see if he could find a few stray feathers from the bird to bring back and tease Jack with. They'd look so lovely against his skin.

Ianto stifled a sigh and scrubbed at his face. Damn it, he missed Jack. He missed his flat and his bed and he even missed the stupid piles of pizza boxes in the Hub. All this wandering around with nothing to do, even if it was in a beautiful castle, was starting to get to him. He needed to get back to base, back to the team, back to Jack. Back to his routines.

Sliding off the balustrade and turning back to the room, he saw Beast standing in the doorway, watching him.

"Forgive me, I did not mean to pry."

Ianto shrugged one shoulder. "It's all right."

"It is late."

Ianto dipped his head in acknowledgement and walked to the table beside the bed. He placed the glass down with exaggerated care on the waiting crystal coaster, wondering at the strange longing that seemed to keep pulling him and Beast together. With any other alien, Ianto would have found a stun gun, knocked him out and been off the grounds calling for backup. But here he was, waiting, in a gilded cage, for Beast to make the next move. It was like this whole place held them all in its thrall and they could only dance to the tune the castle set.

"You cannot sleep?" Beast asked, coming to stand beside Ianto.

Ianto looked over at Beast. "No." He slipped the cufflinks out of his shirt and carefully placed them back in their box. He ran his fingers along the tops of the rainbow-hued links, marveling at their diversity and beauty.

"Neither can I." Beast nodded and walked to the balcony. "But that is hardly a hardship on a night such as this."

"No." Ianto watched Beast step through the open doors and out onto the balcony.

"Some people believe," Beast said, looking out towards the peacock in the garden, "that the white peacock is a representation of both good and evil."

Ianto regarded Beast with a raised eyebrow. Beast grinned, leaning back against the balustrade so that he could see Ianto and watch the peacock. Ianto crossed his arms and sat on the side of the bed, one toe digging into the thick blue carpet.

"The story goes that a peacock was charged with guarding the gates to Paradise when the devil approached. In defense of the sacred lands, the peacock ate the devil, and in this way the devil was able to get inside Paradise. And so evil entered into good and gave the bird its iridescent shading."

Ianto shook his head with a smile.

"Ah, you smile again," Beast said, clearly pleased with himself.

"So which do you see yourself as? The devil or the guardian?"

"Would you believe me if I said both?"

Ianto chuckled and nodded. "Would you believe me if I said yes?"

The peacock called out to his hen, drawing their attention back to his display. Beast watched the white bird parade around the grounds and Ianto watched Beast. Even without Owen's medical training, Ianto could see that there was something very wrong with Beast and that he had gotten worse in the time that Ianto had been in the castle. He just wished he could make Beast understand that Jack and the team could help him.

Ianto pushed off the bed and walked to the desk where he'd placed his PDA and his comm unit. He fingered the ear piece, knowing there was still no signal, and wondering for the hundredth time what he could do to change that.

"You are unhappy here."

Beast had glided into the room and was standing a few meters away, concern or something like it clear on his face. Behind him, his tail beat a rapid tattoo of worry. Ianto set the ear piece back on the desk. He'd meant to look back at Beast, to have a conversation with him, but he found his eyes drawn back to his PDA and everything it represented.

"For all its luxury, your castle is still my prison."

"I wish you could feel otherwise."

"So do I…. but my life is out there." Ianto pointed out through the balcony windows to the world beyond the castle. "On the other side of your wall. And... I miss it."

"And him?"

"Yes." Ianto nodded, suddenly uncomfortable. "I'm worried about him. He was very ill when I left. Owen, our doctor, had no idea how to help him. I don't know what has been happening while I've been gone and I don't know how to do nothing."

"Perhaps…" Beast turned slowly and Ianto watched him look around the room. "Perhaps it was a good thing your Jack came when he did."

Ianto stared at Beast in surprise. This was the last thing he had expected to hear from him.

Beast walked away from Ianto to pace slowly around the room. He wandered from the desk to the wardrobe, to the bed, his hands lingering on various objects along the way. There was something in the way Beast moved that worried Ianto, almost as if he were saying goodbye to something or someone.

"I've lived alone for so long that I don't know what it is to care about another person. I did not remember what it was to feel regret for my actions until I injured you, or to be pleased at kindness until you helped me."

He stopped in front of the landscape painting and stared up at it for so long that Ianto thought he had forgotten where he was. But then Beast spoke again.

"I never learned how to lie, so I could not recognize the lies in another person, and that failing will likely cost me my life."

Beast reached out to touch the painting, but stopped just before his fingertips touched the surface. He pulled his hand back slowly. In the candlelight, Ianto saw tears sink into the fur around Beast's eyes. If he had not been leaning in, Ianto would have missed Beast's whispered words: "Je t'aime, Maman."

Beast turned to face Ianto, only the dampness on his cheeks giving indication of his grief.

"I told you that my father hid our ship and its power sources."

Ianto nodded, hands in his pockets.

"That ship is here on the grounds." Beast turned and pointed through the balcony doors into the heart of the garden. Ianto walked to the doors and looked out. Beast's fingers directed his eyes to an old stone building at the center of the castle grounds. As the moon came out from behind the clouds, its silver light glinted off the lead glass windows that were set into the front wall of the building.

"The building is a visage to disguise our ship. This will grant you access."

Ianto watched Beast withdraw a cube from the pouch at his waste. The cube had rounded edges and was made of glass or crystal. On the surface facing Ianto was the image of a key. As Ianto looked at the cube, it seemed to glow with a golden light, yet when he shifted his head, it looked copper, and when he tilted his head the other way, it looked silver.

"This crystal is the Key, quite literally. It is the only one that can banish the illusion that conceals the ship and begin the processes to wake her from her sleep."

"Wake her?"

"The Diana is a living ship, a blend of sentient and latent molecules in perfect harmony that has carried my clan across the stars for generations."

Beast pressed a button on the Key crystal. "Watch."

Ianto looked through the open doors again. A beam of golden light suffused the tiny outbuilding. The walls shimmered and, as Ianto watched, the stone dissolved. From under the image of the building another shape appeared and blossomed. Its organic flowing forms expanded, contracted, and then settled into a glowing oblong shape. Where there had been stone lines and ivy, Ianto could now see a ship without angles or sharp edges, its surface flowing with an ever-moving prism of gold, silver and copper light.

The birds and night creatures had sprung away from the transforming ship in a cacophony of calls and cries, but now they settled back to brooding silence. Ianto could hear a faint hum rising through the night.

"She's lovely," Ianto sighed.

"She is yours now." Beast placed the Key in Ianto's hand. "In trust."

"I don't understand."

"If you do not return, then this will be the last time I will ever see the Diana. And this room will become my burial chamber."

"Return? You're letting me go?"

"Your Jack needs healing. And you believe that you and your friends have the power to help me, so yes, I am letting you go."

"But why?"

"I am dying, Ianto. And you have taught me how to hope again."

"Beast, I don't know what to say… thank you." Ianto turned towards the room. "It's a twenty-five minute drive at this hour from here to the base if I push it…"

"Ianto, wait." Beast followed Ianto into the room and stopped him with a hand on his arm. "I have one more thing for you."

Beast reached into his pouch again and pulled out another cube. "This is the Glove. It, of all the Crystals, has two powers."

Ianto rolled his eyes. "I've always said gloves come in pairs."

"Indeed," Beast said with a smile. "This one can take you wherever you wish to go in the blink of an eye, though it will cause you deep heartache."

Ianto looked at him sharply. "What happens?"

"The crystals must have a source of power in order to perform their secondary functions. Each one draws upon that to which it is most attuned. The Glove is attuned to the salt water of tears and blood."

"So I will cry or bleed?"

"Or both, if you choose to use the other function."

"Which is?"

"The power to heal."

Ianto rocked back on his heels. "Oh."

"Be careful, Ianto. You can only use the crystal once per power cycle for each action, and the greater the distance traveled or the greater the healing, the deeper the drain it will make on you."

Ianto took a deep breath and nodded.

"Is he worth your blood and tears?"

"Yes," Ianto said without hesitation.

Beast handed the Glove crystal to Ianto. "There are three other crystals that you must find if you wish to heal me as well. Your Jack has the Rose."

Ianto stared at Beast in surprise for a moment and then felt his face break into what he feared was a completely ridiculous grin. "He really did get me a rose."

"In a way, yes," Beast nodded, smiling softly. "The other two are the Horse and the Mirror."

"The two stolen power sources."

"Yes," Beast agreed. "You must have all five if I am to complete the repairs to the Diana and finally go back to the stars."

"We will find them, Beast. If there is a way to get you back into space, we will find it, I promise."

"Do not make promises, Ianto. Just take the crystals and go to your friends. I will be here if you come back."

"I will be back."

It took Ianto four long minutes to gather up his personal gear and center himself enough to try Beast's alien technology. He slid the tuxedo jacket back on for lack of anything better to wear and a desperate need of pockets, then nodded to Beast to let him know he was ready.

"Think about your Jack. Think about where he is right now, and how you want to be with him, then close your eyes and the crystal will do the rest."

Ianto took a deep breath and held it for a minute, trying to calm his racing thoughts, then let it out slowly. He pulled the Glove crystal out of his pocket and held it in his palm. He pointed to one of the buttons.

Beast nodded. "Remember, the transport will require your tears and the healing your blood."

"Right," Ianto said, trying not to think too hard about what either offering really meant.

Ianto thought about Jack lying in the medical suite where Owen would have most likely have put him to keep an eye on him, and pushed the button.

Violet and blue light spilled out of the cube, filling the room with an underwater glow. A tidal wave of emotion swelled up in his chest. He was washed in love and desire, in sorrow and loss, in need and a thousand other emotions, each one accompanied by images of his past.

He sees Lisa, her eyes closed in bliss, drinking her first cup of his coffee. "You're a wicked man, you are, Mr. Jones. May just have to marry you for your coffee."

 

He remembers rolling his eyes as Jack turned to him from across the Hub, his hands pressed together in prayer, pleading with him for a cup of coffee.

 

He can feel Gwen leaning her head on his shoulder. She has a sleepy grin on her face and she's telling him about Rhys proposing to her.

"He loves me just as I am. Can you imagine? Rhys knows nothing and everything about me and he loves me anyway. How is that possible?" She hugs his arm to her chest and sighs, happier than he's heard her in ages.

 

Jack's head is in his lap, a book in one hand, the other dangling down over the cushions of the couch to run lazy fingers over and across Ianto's foot.

"A flower unplucked is but left to the falling," Jack reads, his voice replacing the Hub's quiet with Robert Frost. "And nothing is gained by not gathering roses."

His own fingers wander aimlessly through the gelled stiffness of Jack's hair. He loves the spiky, crunching feel of the product as it crumbles. He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the soft leather of the couch in Jack's office, letting the night take him into peace.

 

Owen is shouting at him. "Don't compare yourself to me. You're just a tea boy!"

He can feel the weight of the gun in his hand, the pressure in his chest, the need to stop Owen, and yet… what if he's right… "I'm much more than that. Jack needs me."

"In your dreams, Ianto. In your sad wet dreams when you're his part-time shag, maybe. That Rift took my lover and my captain. So if I die trying to beat it, then it will all be in the line of duty."

There's the recoil as the bullet flies from the chamber and the look on Owen's face as the shot impacts his shoulder - all anger and shock and triumph - as he triggers the Rift anyway.

 

He can feel the metal grating digging into his knees, almost as cold as the gun in Jack's hand pointed at his head. He's beyond fear or pain. His world has exploded. Lisa is gone but he can't stop - can't let go. There's nothing left of him to let go of, so he defends the past.

"You're not listening to me! The conversion was never completed!"

"She already tried to kill Gwen!" Jack shouts. He's right, but Ianto can't stop, can't give up, not now. "You think she's gonna stop there? There is no turning back for her now!"

"I'm...not giving up on her. I love her. Can you understand that, Jack? Haven't you ever loved anyone?

 

He could see the sorrow in Tosh's eyes the morning after. "I'm sorry…" she said. "About the mind reading…about what I saw, the pain you're going through."

He'd tried to tell her to forget the whole thing, but she caught his arm and held him tight; whether she was crying for him or herself, he was never sure.

"I'm so sorry, Ianto. I didn't know… I didn't know that you felt that way." Her grief only made the rats hungrier.

 

Jack, lying in his arms, blood pumping out of the open vein at his throat where the alien weapon had caught him. He'd stepped in front of Tosh, saving her life and losing his own. Again. The stop watch is cold in Ianto's hand as it ticks down the minutes to resurrection.

 

Ianto felt the tears spilling, unbidden, down his cheek as the crystal pulled tears from his soul to power his journey. His whole body felt liquid and raw, exposed to the moment. He clutched his arms to his chest and held on to the cube for dear life.

 

Chapter Seventeen

 

Jack awoke desperate for air, from a dream of claws and fangs chasing him through a series of long tunnels. His legs were tangled in the layers of blankets Owen kept tucking around him. His pillow was pushed high up into the headboard and when Jack looked, he thought it might be cutting off the IV line, but at the moment he didn't really care. His heart was still racing and he felt like there were eyes watching him from every corner of the room. Not a sensation he liked, ever.

He kicked his legs around, pushing the blankets around until he could move again, then dragged the pillow down and rolled around until he wedged it under his head enough to see the room from the bed. What he wanted to do was throw the damn thing across the room and then get up, pick it up and throw it again until he felt better, but he knew that if Owen didn't get to him first, his body would. He ran a shaking hand through his sweat-damp hair and sighed. It had been a very long time since he'd been injured in such a way that he couldn't heal and he was starting to remember why he hated it. Maybe Rose had done him a favor after all. Unless this mess turned out to be forever, and then he was going to hunt her down and wring her pretty little neck.

Jack's chest ached where Beast had clawed him. Moving around, while satisfying on one level, had aggravated the wound tracks and made everything worse on another level. He closed his eyes and took several slow deep breaths, willing the pain to calm down.

After a while, he felt his heart rate slow and his breathing settle. The pain in his chest was still unpleasant, but not so bad that he was willing to give in and page Owen for more painkillers just yet.

A tremor shook the bed and a low rumbling sound filled the small room. Jack opened his eyes to find everything suffused with purple and blue light.

"What the...?"

His bed stopped shaking and the sound faded. For a moment, the room seemed caught between light and dark and then the underwater lightshow faded and the yellow of the bed side lamp reclaimed the room. Jack started to reach for his comm unit when a sound near the bed caught his attention.

He heard an agonized groan, and then a shadow fell away from the wall to land with a sob against the bed. The shadow resolved into the shuddering form of a man in a black suit that was the right size and shape to be Ianto. When Jack touched the man's short hair, it was damp to the skin.

"Ianto?" he whispered, stroking the shaking head.

Ianto reached out and grabbed at Jack's hand, his sobs filling the small room. Jack laced their fingers together and murmured nonsense words until Ianto's breathing slowed and the cries hiccupped to a halt. At last, Ianto raised his head off his arms, his face a mess of tears and snot. Jack thought it was the most beautiful and hopelessly endearing face he had ever seen.

"Ianto?"

"Yep," Ianto nodded taking a deep breath. "Yes, it's me."

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Long story." Ianto levered himself to a sitting position. He sniffed several times and dragged a sleeve across he eyes. "Don't worry about it. I have something for you."

Ianto took Jack's hand and placed an object between their hands. "Hold this."

Jack looked down. The object was a crystal cube, much like the Mirror Jack had used to find Ianto. It was the same shape and size, but a deeper, darker blue when he looked at it. Along one side there was a carving of a glove.

"Ianto…"

"Just wait." Ianto pushed a button and the cube flashed a deep blue, washing the room in indigo and cobalt light.

Jack felt a tingling along his palm where it touched the cube that quickly turned to a burning hot liquid wave pulsing along his arm and deep into his chest. Heat flowed into the cuts on his neck and shoulder, pouring down the edges of the wounds and filling them with hot liquid. He was floating and burning at once.

Jack cried out, arching up off the bed.

The pulse of a heartbeat filled his ears, syncing with his own heart's rhythm. He was breathing with it, breathing in the deep blue liquid from the crystal and breathing out the damaged tissue. Each pulse forced deeper and deeper changes into his body, healing him cell by cell, ocean by ocean.

Through the pounding waves, he felt Ianto's hands convulse in his. He saw images of Ianto's life bleeding into the crystal carried on a wave of blood.

Lisa's broken body, covered in blood.

Jack bleeding to death on the ground.

Tosh's face riddled with cuts and bruises.

Jack lying in a heap, blood pouring out of a gash in his chest.

Owen in the cage, the Weevil's claws ripping through his flesh.

Jack dying in Ianto's arms, blood on both their hands.

Jack tried to pull away, to stop whatever Ianto was doing, but he couldn't move, couldn't do anything but feel the waters filling him. Another wave of healing took him and he cried out.

Gwen's stomach bleeding from buckshot.

Blood coating Jack's face.

Lost to the cube's effects, Jack barely heard Owen burst through the door.

"Jack! What's wrong?" Owen shouted.

Jack shuddered, his body tossed back and forth on the bed. He felt strong hands press him down trying to slow his movements. He cried out when Ianto's hands slid out of his, afraid he was losing everything in that moment. Then the hands were back, wrapped around his arms, part of the weight restraining him.

He felt the waters in his body press against his skin, pushing at the wounds until they shivered and folded in on themselves, healed by the power of the cube. Jack cried out again, screaming through the transition from broken to healed in one searing moment,

Then he died.

 

Jack gasped back to life to the sound of Ianto screaming.

"No! No! He promised me the crystal would heal him," Ianto wept, clutching at Jack's arm.

"Ianto… Ianto!" Owen shouted. "Ianto, mate, calm down!"

Ianto dropped his head on Jack's chest, sobbing. Jack raised one hand up to pet Ianto's damp hair very softly. "Shhhhh. It's okay," he whispered.

"Jack!"

"How do you feel?" Owen asked.

Jack took a couple of deep breaths. He looked around at the room, trying to get his bearings, and then at Ianto crying beside him. "Ianto, what happened? That cube… what does it do?"

"I thought you were dead."

Jack smiled tenderly. "I can't die; you know that."

"You were stuck, and then you died and I didn't know…"

"Ianto, you're not making sense," Jack said, brushing the hair away from Ianto's forehead.

"Jack, look at me. How are you? How do you feel?" Owen asked.

"Fine." Jack stopped and thought more closely about Owen's question. He really did feel fine; better than he had in a while. He reached up to the bandages on his chest. Owen worked with him to peel the tape away and they all looked at the skin there in wonder. It was perfectly healed with no sign of scarring. No sign that he had ever been so much as scratched by a feather. He looked up at Owen, awed. "It looks normal."

"It worked then," Ianto said.

"What worked?" Owen asked, still in shock.

"The Glove."

"What glove?" Jack asked.

"Beast gave me two of his power sources. They're crystals." He dug in his jacket pocket and pulled out a second crystal. This one shimmered gold and silver when he handed it to Jack. "That's the Key; it activates Beast's ship. I promised to bring it back to him, with reinforcements."

"Reinforcements? Wait a minute..."

"He needs our help, Jack," Ianto said, his voice rising in volume and pitch. "I promised we would help him; please, you have to…"

"Shhh… its okay. We'll figure something out." Jack ran a hand along Ianto's cheek, wiping the fresh tears away. "You said something about a glove?"

"The other crystal is the Glove. It can heal as well as transport people. That's it, there." Ianto nodded at the cube that had rolled to the side of Jack's bed.

Jack reached over and picked up the crystal, turning both over in his hands. "They're beautiful."

"Using the Glove comes with a price, though."

Jack turned back to Ianto and nodded. He had a feeling he already knew the cost Ianto had paid for the healing, but he needed to hear the words from Ianto.

"Which is?"

"Salted liquids - tears and blood - if you use both functions."

"You bloody fool," Owen exclaimed, coming around the bed. "No wonder you can't raise your damn head off your arms!"

Owen took hold of Ianto's wrist to check Ianto's pulse. Owen frowned but said nothing, moving on to check Ianto's temperature, eyes and ears, listen to his breathing, and finally insist that Ianto lie down.

"I need to get you hooked up to a machine so I can monitor your vitals and start you on fluids. You're a bloody mess, tea-boy. Come on."

Owen got his arms around Ianto's chest and tugged him into a standing position. With Owen to lean on, they were able to get Ianto's jacket off while Jack slid over to the far side of his bed. Then he and Owen jockeyed Ianto onto it beside Jack so he could hug Ianto to him while Owen fussed about medications and foolish Torchwood members.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry," Ianto mumbled, trying to hide his face from Jack.

Jack took Ianto's hands and tugged them close to his chest. "Shhhh. You did great. Just rest now, Ianto."

Ianto turned his head into Jack's arms and cried. Jack looked up at Owen. He'd seen Ianto in a lot of situations. He'd seen him furious, happy, even sex-drunk and, once or twice during those horrible days after the cannibals, held him while he cried. But Jack had never seen him this hysterical, this out-of-control and this exposed in his grief, and he'd certainly never seen Ianto like this in front of Owen.

"Can you stop the reaction?"

"I don't even know how the damn thing works. At this point, all I'm sure I can do is keep him alive. He's going to have to ride out the effects of that thing. At least no one's ever died from embarrassment."

Owen got Ianto hooked up to an IV and monitor as he'd threatened, then disconnected Jack from the equipment connected to him since all of his readings indicated that he was perfectly healthy. Owen tucked a blanket around Ianto's shoulders.

"He needs to sleep," Owen said with one hand on the door.

Jack nodded. "I know."

"Really sleep, Jack."

"I do know the difference between sex and sleep, Owen, and even when sleep is more important," Jack said, letting his frustration slip its leash just a little. Owen nodded and slipped out of the room.

Jack lay his head down next to Ianto's and pulled him close. Ianto had stopped crying for the moment, but Jack could sense that there were more waves still to come. He would hold him through whatever came; it was the least he could do.

 

Chapter Eighteen

 

Gwen ran a hand over the back of her neck and squeezed down, trying to get the spot Rhys always managed to find that got rid of her headaches. She could use his talented hands right now. Her neck was a mess of knots and her head was pounding. She'd had too much of her own coffee, which, since it was made with the beans Ianto approved, was only half bad, but it was still too much caffeine. She was worried about Jack and Ianto, and what the hell were they doing in France anyway? They were supposed to be home, in lovely gray, rainy Cardiff, watching over their Rift, not some foreign set of Rift spikes that UNIT couldn't be bothered to sort out by themselves! Oh, what she wouldn't give for a cup of Ianto's coffee and one of Rhys' massages right about now.

She gave up on her neck and tapped her mouse. The screensaver, some horrible French cubist painting, vanished and her report reappeared. She was compiling all the data they had on the alien power sources, or trying to, since they only really had hard data on the one and a whole lot of circumstantial evidence about the others.

"Jack!" Tosh let out a squeal of delight.

Gwen looked up to see Tosh running to meet a completely healthy-looking Jack as he walked into the main work area. She grinned and jumped out of her chair to join them, crying for joy right along with Tosh.

Jack grinned at her and let go of Tosh to swoop Gwen into a huge hug. He lifted her off the ground, laughing, and hugged her with all the strength she remembered.

"You're well!" Gwen said, touching his face in amazement.

"Yup."

"You are truly better?" Avenant asked as Jack walked farther into the room. Gwen held onto the arm that Jack had securely tucked around her waist and when she looked over, she could see Tosh had done the same to his other arm.

"I'm better."

"How is that possible, Jack?" Tosh asked quietly.

"Ianto," he said simply, and then, disentangling his arm from around Gwen's waist, he dug into his pants pocket and came out with two crystals. "With a little help from the alien. Beast sent Ianto back using these as transport and as a way to cure me. It worked."

"Ianto's here?!" Gwen looked over her shoulder toward the medical suite, expecting to see Ianto walking through the door, a cheeky grin on his face, adjusting his tie, and just waiting to tell them all that they had been worried for nothing.

"Yes," Jack said softly. There was concern in his eyes.

"He's recovering," Owen added, leaning forward in his desk chair and putting up a hand to forestall Gwen's questions. "The crystal he used carries quite a kick. He'll be out for a couple of hours."

"Oh," Gwen said quietly. "He'll be okay?"

Jack smiled at her and nodded.

Tosh reached for the crystals in Jack's hand, taking one and holding it up to the light. Her eyes were wide and softly glowing. It was what Gwen thought of as Tosh's I'll get you, my pretty face because she always wore it right before digging into a problem and hunting down the answers they needed.

"They look like that crystal UNIT found… the one everyone calls the Magic Mirror."

"Indeed they do," Avenant said, leaning in for a closer look. His eyes were very dark and his whole body seemed to have tensed up.

Gwen reached for the other crystal. "Is it possible that the story about the Princes' treasure is real? That there really is a Glove, a Mirror, and… what were the other two?

"A key and a horse," Avenant finished, distracted. He appeared enthralled by the crystals, his eyes fixed upon them. His hands twitched and he looked like he desperately wanted to hold them. She wondered if they had different effects on different people. She looked at Owen, but he seemed fine - his usual nonchalant pretending-to-be-bored self. And Jack was Jack.

"Ianto said these were the Key and the Glove." Jack pointed to Gwen's crystal and then Tosh's, "So yeah… I think there might just be something to that legend."

Gwen rotated the Key in her hands, watching the color shift from gold to silver to copper as the light hit the different sides. She pressed a finger into the carving of the key, feeling the edges curve and dip along the pattern. A thought occurred to her and she glanced at Jack.

"We have the Key and the Glove, and UNIT has the Mirror. So where is the Horse? Or is that the other power source that was stolen?"

"What stolen power source?" Jack asked.

"Ianto managed to get a message to us while you were sick. It said that two power sources - I'm assuming he meant these crystals - went missing, one eighty years ago and one just four weeks ago," Tosh replied, looking up from the crystal in her hand.

Gwen turned to Avenant. "When did you say UNIT found the Mirror crystal?"

"About a month ago."

"That's it, then. The Horse has to be the power crystal that was stolen in 1929," Owen said.

"So where is it?" Jack asked, folding his arms across his chest.

"We haven't been able to turn up many leads from that time period," Avenant said.

"Well," Tosh began, and then stopped, hesitating. She shook her head and looked down, flustered, but then continued, gathering confidence as she spoke. "There is that UNIT officer who said that Hillary Westmore ordered him to stay with the car while she investigated the Rift energy traces on her own, in 1929. Not something even the most foolhardy Torchwood operative would do, especially not a woman in that era."

"A Torchwood operative from London?" Jack asked.

Tosh nodded. "Did you know her?"

Jack's gaze went distant for a moment. "The name sounds familiar." Then he shook his head. "I don't know."

"The file states that she was fairly junior, so maybe you just never met her?"

"There weren't a lot of female operatives in Torchwood in the 20s, even in London. Odd, though. Why send a junior operative on a mission to a foreign country? That's more of a job for someone with diplomatic training."

"Not much about her mission makes sense," Gwen put in. "Ordering her escort to stay behind while she investigated a wooded area alone? That seems more than a little strange."

"Still, a Torchwood officer would have outranked the UNIT escort. Surely he would have followed her orders and stayed with the car," Avenant argued.

"Or maybe he lied," Tosh said.

"Why?" Avenant asked.

"Good question," Jack said, thoughtfully. "Who was the UNIT officer?"

Tosh turned to the computer next to her, put the crystal down and began typing in a search request. "Checking… found him. His name was Private Ludovic Merchant. Oh!"

She looked up at Jack.

"What?"

"He disappeared 12 November 1929."

"That's only two days before Hillary arrived back in London," Gwen said. "Did they find any sign of him after that?"

"Nothing. I'm not even sure they searched… I can't find any other mention of Private Merchant after that date, or before October 31st. It's like he only existed for those few weeks."

"Well, that's bloody weird," Owen said.

"More than that, it's damn suspicious," Jack grumped. "Tosh, keep digging; see if you can find anything else about our missing private - family, friends, anything. I'm betting he knew something about the Horse, and if we are going to find it, we need to find him."

"Jack, that was eighty years ago. He could very well be dead."

"Fine; then we'll find someone who knows something about him and the Horse crystal. Just keep looking."

Jack sagged against the nearest table and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Right, that's it," Owen grumbled. "You may be all magically healed up, but you still haven't had anything like proper food in days, so let's go. Off to the kitchen with you."

Gwen started to follow as Owen took Jack by the arm and tugged him toward the door, but he waved her off. "You folks can handle things here without us for a bit, yeah?"

"Sure thing," Gwen reluctantly agreed.

Owen didn't wait for her answer. He bundled Jack out of the far door of the room.

Gwen turned to Tosh and Avenant and shrugged.

"Come on, Tosh. You take Cardiff, I'll go through London's notes. Avenant, see what you can find in UNIT's database for France." Gwen settled into her desk chair and grinned up at the other two, trying her best to be commanding and compassionate at the same time. "Between us, I bet we can find Merchant before Jack's done with dinner!"

Tosh smiled and gave her a little nod before focusing on her computer and setting to work.

"Avenant?" Gwen called. The French man was looking lost again, his green eyes blown black with some need driving through him. Both his arms were twitching, his fingers opening and shutting convulsively, and in the shadowed light his elegant fingernails looked too much like claws for Gwen's comfort.

"Avenant? Are you all right?" she tried again.

Avenant started, looking at her with wild eyes that cleared to calm green as she watched.

"That sounds fine. I will get started right away," Avenant said, as though nothing odd had happened. He sat beside Tosh and pulled the laptop closer to him, his arm brushing against her. Tosh looked over at Avenant and smiled sweetly.

Gwen covered her mouth in horror. Something was deeply wrong with Avenant and Tosh was falling in love with the Frenchman.

 

Chapter Nineteen

 

Ianto lay on his side and stared at the patterns of soft yellow light on the wall in the medical suite. Everything was so dissimilar from where he had just been. The bed was smaller, the sheets rougher, and even the air smelled differently, being bottled up inside a steel building on a river pier instead of wafting through the open window of a stone castle. It was what he'd wanted, but it all felt wrong somehow.

His head hurt. His eyes ached from crying so much and his heart felt like it would never be whole again. Ianto couldn't remember ever feeling this horrible before, even in all the nightmarish days with Lisa. Back then, it was just living until the next day and the next until a cure could be found. There had been fleeting hope for a while, and then nothing but grief and guilt. Now there was joy and sorrow mixed together and it was that confluence of conflicting emotions that kept tearing him apart.

"Damn it," Ianto whispered. He balled his fists around the edges of the blanket and squeezed his eyes shut. He wanted to will the tears away. If he could just push them back far enough, maybe…

"Hey, there." Jack shook his shoulder and he opened his eyes without thinking. "Hey, what's wrong?"

Ianto shook his head, afraid to speak and let the words have power over him.

"You'll give yourself a headache like that," Jack said, pulling a chair up and sitting down to stroke his hand along Ianto's shoulder and down his back.

Over and over, Jack's hand traveled its soft, reassuring circuit. His hand feathered through Ianto's hair, across his shoulders, down his back, then up the crook of his arm to start the journey over again. Each pass of the firm, unquestioning hand settled something in Ianto, pushed the memories back a step and helped him breath again.

"How you feeling?" Jack asked after a while.

Ianto rolled over so he could see Jack's face. Jack smiled and let the motion of Ianto's body carry his hand over to Ianto's cheek, where he picked up the rhythm of his strokes again, this time along the front of Ianto's body. Jack's hand slid smoothly over the planes of Ianto's cheek, across his lips, down along his chin and neck, to finally rest lightly over Ianto's heart.

"Like an idiot," Ianto answered at last.

"Don't. You saved me, and got yourself out of trouble. Nothing idiotic about that."

"And damn near killed myself in the process."

"Nothing of the sort."

"Oh god, I'm dying."

"No, you're not! Why do you say that?" Jack pulled his hand away, panicked. Ianto grabbed his hand and pulled it back to his chest, chuckling.

"You're being nice," he said with a lifted eyebrow.

"I'm always nice."

"Sure."

"I am!" Jack stuck out his lip and tried to look pouty but only managed to look silly. That made Ianto want to laugh even more, which had probably been Jack's motive in the first place, so Ianto gave in.

"Fine, you're nice."

"See." Jack leaned in and planted a kiss on Ianto's nose. "Told you."

Ianto scrunched his face and dragged the back of his hand across his nose, but he was smiling as he wiped the sloppy kiss away. He pointed at Jack. "You're smiling. You must be feeling better."

"So are you."

"I am. Thank you."

Jack leaned in and kissed Ianto softly on the lips. Ianto reached up and ran a hand through Jack's hair, marveling at the lack of crunch in the strands. He laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing." Ianto smiled and kissed Jack again, deeper this time, needing to taste more of the other man, needing to be reminded of what happiness and sorrow felt like in real time.

Jack followed Ianto's lead, matching him kiss for kiss, layer for layer, giving him everything he asked for. Ianto ran his hands along Jack's arms and Jack traced the lines of Ianto's biceps under the stiff white dress shirt.

Ianto's need drove him past his body's capacity, but he didn't care. He bit into Jack's neck and scraped at Jack's shoulders, wanting to fill some place that had opened up like a pit inside of him.

Jack pulled away. "Ianto, stop."

Tears pushed at Ianto's eyes again and sobs clogged his throat, but he couldn't stop. He reached for Jack and cried out when he found only air.

"Ianto! Stop!"

Ianto opened his eyes and looked at Jack, panicked. Jack looked back at him calmly, without pity or disgust, and gathered him in his arms. Jack held him as he shook with shame and grief.

"I can't do this Jack. I can't."

"It'll be over soon. Just hang in there," Jack crooned.

A moment later, the door to the room slammed open and Gwen barged in with Tosh and Owen on her heels.

"Jack!" Gwen said without preamble, "the crystals are gone."

"What?"

"No!" Ianto cried.

"Yeah. All three of them," Owen said, coming to stand near Ianto and checking the readouts on the monitor.

"I had them on the counter," Tosh said, her hands waving in her distress, "to run a comparison on them. We turned around for just a moment and they were gone."

"…and Avenant as well," Gwen finished for her.

"Damn!"

"We have to get them back. I promised!"

"I know," Jack said, rubbing Ianto's arm.

"He'll die, Jack." Ianto struggled to sit up and climb out of the bed. "Beast will die without the crystals."

"Ianto, stop… you're not well enough for this." Owen pressed Ianto back into bed.

"I have to get the crystals back. I promised him!"

"Ianto, stop it!"

"He'll die, Jack! He's dying without them."

"He's right, Jack," Owen said.

Jack turned to Owen, one hand still on Ianto's arm. "Explain."

"Part of that message Ianto sent was a rose from Beast's garden. It's very rare and tied to the area around the castle. That strain of roses is dying, Jack. I've gone back over the records for the plant. Each time one of the power crystals went missing, there was a marked decrease in chlorophyll production for only this species of rose - the decur."

"So the leaves are getting paler," Jack shrugged and gestured for Owen to get to the point.

"Not just paler. They are losing their ability to absorb nutrients from the sun. Along with the loss of chlorophyll, their genetic structure is also literally falling apart. The species is dying."

"Falling apart…like Beast," Jack said thoughtfully. "When I grabbed his arm I felt scales under my fingers, but he had fur like a cat. All those pieces of him crammed together to make up one being."

"One being that should not exist," Owen said.

"But he does exist!"

Ianto stared around the room at his friends and coworkers. None of them said anything. They looked at each other as though they were afraid to look at him. He felt the tension inside him spiraling tighter. He tried to fight it, but the need to help, to defend, and to protect Beast was overwhelming. He looked to Gwen. She, of all people, had to understand.

"He does! I saw him. I talked with him. He's as real as any of us in this room!"

"Of course he is," Gwen said, patting his arm.

Ianto threw himself back into the pillows with a growl. "I hate this." He put an arm over his eyes, hoping to blot out the room and the mess of his head with it.

"It'll pass," Owen said. "Cheer up; at least your hemoglobin levels have improved."

"Yeah, brilliant, thanks."

"Ok. Avenant," Jack said. "What do we know about him?"

There was a long pause. Ianto peeked from under his elbow at Tosh, knowing how uncomfortable she must be feeling in the moment. He willed her to be brave and watched her gather her courage and face Jack.

"He emailed me a few months ago. Said he'd been studying my reports in the UNIT database. He had all the codes and passwords, Jack. I checked twice!"

"I believe you."

"He's been here with us the whole time we've been working. Helping with the searches and being damn good at keeping the highe-ups out of our way."

"Though, honestly, he's crap at running searches."

They all turned to Owen.

"Tell me you didn't notice that every time you asked him to run a search, he came up empty-handed, but when Tosh went looking for the same information, she always found something?"

"Well… "

"He did seem a little less than brilliant, now that I think about it." Gwen bit her lip. "And… there's something else."

Jack nodded at her to continue.

"Earlier, when you showed us the other two crystals, he looked… well, weird."

"Weird, how?" Owen asked, all doctor now.

"Twitchy and…off. Not like himself at all. It was like he had to have the crystals. Honestly, I thought he was going a bit mad, like he was going to tell me he could hear them singing or something."

"Like he was possessed?" Owen asked.

"Yeah, something like that." Gwen nodded. "I don't think I'm surprised he took them. It was like he had to touch them."

"Damn," Tosh said. "He played me."

"He played us all," Jack said. "Question is, who is he, really? And where the hell did he go with the damn crystals?

"And does he have the Horse?"

They all looked at Ianto.

"It would make sense, if he took the others… though, come to think of it… I don't know what he thinks he can do with only four Crystals."

"What'd you mean only four?" Owen asked.

Ianto sat up, feeling calmer. "Beast said it takes five to open the ship and activate her."

"Her?" Tosh asked with a smile.

"Ship?" Jack asked, with a very different smile.

"Yep."

"Where's the fifth crystal?" Tosh asked.

"Jack has it."

"I have it?!"

"Yep," Ianto said with a grin. "You got me a rose, after all."

"Oh…oh!" Jack grinned broadly and went to the door where his greatcoat was hanging.

Jack reached into the side pocket of his coat and retrieved the Rose crystal. With a flourish, he handed to the crystal to Ianto, its carved rose shining pink in the room's low light.

"Your rose, sir," he said with a wink.

 

Chapter Twenty

 

Beast slowly paced the length of Ianto's room, the room that his father had designed for his mother, before they'd known she would die of her injuries. His hands lingered on the edges of the furniture, feeling the love his father and brother had poured into each grain of wood. She would have loved this room, with its rich colors and soft fabrics. They had chosen it because of its view of the Diana and the gardens. Father had said that way Mother could always have something to remind her of the beauty of their homeworld.

As he walked and remembered, bits of scale and fur fell behind, sticking to furniture and fabric. Beast knew he was crumbling.

Outside the balcony, the barrier wall crackled, sending sparks of light into the night. What should not be visible was clear as it faded, all of its power sources scattered beyond its reach.

Beast walked back to the bed that Ianto had slept in. Resting on the duvet was the box of cuff links which he had gifted the human. He opened the box and ran his hand along the tarnishing metal links. Something about its presence there on the bed cracked the last hold on his heart. Believing he had nothing left he curled up on the bed and let the tears flow without shame.


	5. Part Five - The Key

Part Five ~ The Key

 

Chapter Twenty-One

 

Avenant sped along Avenue Georges Pompidou, weaving in and out of the late-night traffic and cursing his luck that there would be a Concert in the Park tonight. There were too many people on the road and they were all blocking his way. He swerved around a slow-moving Volvo and sped up to pass a second, even older, German car before he ran out of passing lane. Another thousand meters up the road, he turned right and away from the worst of the traffic.

The Horse crystal was precariously balanced in his right hand between his fingers and the top edge of the steering wheel. It still glowed in sullen smoky red pulses, and it burned his hand even through his glove, but he couldn't let it go. Not now. He'd had to use it to shoot out the main gate at the base when the guards refused to let him pass without authorization from that fils de pute Harkness. He didn't want to use it, but they'd given him no choice. Harkness had given him no choice in any of this. But he had the crystals now. He could get to the ship and make the pain in his head stop; he could make it all stop and find peace again.

He turned onto Rue des Menestriers du Perigord, ignoring the horn from the lone driver behind him as he veered the car without signaling. Then he pressed his foot to the floor and pushed the SUV as fast as it would go in the dark.

Shivering, Avenant switched the Horse Crystal to his left hand and punched the heater buttons with his right. Hot air filled the vehicle, warming his face, but it did nothing for the cold biting into his bones.

The SUV shuddered as the thick tires traded smooth pavement for crumbling dirt. He lost his hold on the crystal, swinging the car madly across the road as he groped for the falling cube. He pulled his foot off the gas in a moment of sanity and finally caught the crystal between his knees with a gasp. He ran a shaking, gloved hand across his eyes, straightened the car and started off again, the cube safely tucked into his coat pocket.

He had passed the rose wall and was jogging along the cobblestone drive with its trees and shadows when Jack's voice reached him over the comm unit.

"Avenant!" Jack's voice hissed in his ear, startling him. They'd been so quiet he'd forgotten he still had it on.

"Talk to me, Avenant!"

"Why?"

"You've hurt one of my team and I need to know why."

"Check again, Harkness. My shots were carefully aimed to dissuade, not to harm."

"And Toshiko?"

Avenant stopped walking and looked over his shoulder toward the SUV and the general direction of the UNIT base, something close to sorrow filling his heart. Toshiko was lovely and he truly enjoyed her company, but nothing was more important than getting home. "I never meant to harm her."

"But you have. You used her to get the information you wanted. To bring us here. And she knows it now."

"She should have known better."

He looked back towards the castle. The trees seemed to be closer and darker along that part of the path. No matter. He shivered and started running again.

"What, than to trust a silky voice and a pretty face?" Jack barked a laugh. "Tosh trusts unconditionally; that's part of what makes her who she is."

"That is not my fault," he hissed.

"But you used that against her to achieve your own ends. Why?"

"I needed her expertise and that of your team to find what was lost."

"The crystals."

"Yes."

"And then what?"

"What shall I say? That I have taken what your lover found? You know that already."

There was silence from Jack and then, "Why did you take the crystals?"

The second barrier wall reared up before Avenant. Sparks of blue light shot wildly from the edges of the wall where it met the stones of the drive and flowed over ancient trees.

Avenant stopped in front of the wall.

"They are mine. Mine by blood and birth."

"I don't follow."

Avenant pulled out the scanner he had taken from Tosh's desk and called up her codes. After a moment, the light flared across the length of the wall and then vanished. He picked up a stick, lobbed it across where he'd last seen the wall meet the drive, and breathed a sigh of relief when it landed unharmed a few meters away.

"Avenant," Jack said again, when the silence had gone on too long. "Explain it to me."

Avenant looked up at the sky, searching for the star patterns he remembered from his childhood, but saw only lights in the darkness. Nothing looked familiar after so long.

"That monster you have all become so fond of is my brother. He holds what is mine. Now, with your gracious help, I can finally go home."

"Where is home?"

"Far out into the stars," Avenant answered softly, longing filling his lungs and mouth, spilling over as tears down his cheek.

"You don't know, do you?" Jack whispered.

Avenant paused and shook his head. "The Diana knows; that's all I need."

"And Beast?"

"What of him?" Avenant bit out.

"He's dying."

"So?"

"You said it yourself: he's your brother. Doesn't that count for something?"

"Why should it?" Avenant shouted. "He trapped me here. Him and our father. Without him, the Diana would never have crashed and our mother would never have died. If they had just given… It's all their fault. All of this! Let him die as well! "

"Five hundred years is a long time to hate."

Avenant looked up at the stars again and then along the drive to the castle. "You have no idea."

He ripped the comm unit from his ear and tossed to the ground. The Captain's voice was still calling out to him as he ran towards the castle. Shout all you want, Captain. I have what I need at last! Avenant thought as he ran, not noticing that his hands and legs were still ice cold.

 

Years of being away from the castle did not change the call in Avenant's mind. He still heard the Diana singing to him as sweetly as she ever did when he was a child. It was not the deep tones and languages he only half-remembered, but it was enough to guide him to her hiding place in the heart of the garden and that was all that mattered.

Walking up to the stone building that was her outer dressing gown, Avenant pulled the four crystals from his pockets. Plucking the Key out of the pile, he held it to his face for a moment, savoring its shape and feel. "Thank you," he whispered to the cube. "Thank you for bringing me home."

He pointed the crystal towards Diana's camouflage and pressed the button on its side.

Gold, silver, and copper light poured out of the crystal, bathing the garden and the building before him in a metallic gleam. Under the lines of light, the building shimmered, its walls dissolving, expanding and reforming into the living, fluid form of the Diana.

Tears welled up in Avenant's eyes. He hadn't believed that he would ever see her again, as much as he had hoped and prayed and even schemed to make this possible.Somewhere inside, he realized that he had given up hope. And now, here she was, just as beautiful and precious as he remembered.

He took a few halting steps toward the glowing surface and reached out his hands, crystals and all. He would sink and sleep in her embrace forever if she would let him. Instead, just as his hand touched the surface, the ship's skin shimmered again, changing colors from gold to sun yellow, to purple to red, to dark blue and back to gold. He pulled his hand away in surprise and the ripple of colors stopped, leaving the skin copper in color. He leaned in again with just one hand, the one with the Horse, Mirror, and Glove crystals. The Diana's skin shivered and morphed once again as soon as he touched her. This time the colors shifted from red to yellow to deep blue to purple and back. A moment later a panel opened in front of him with five image squares. At the top was an image of a Key; below that there were two squares showing an image of a mirror and a horse and below that two more squares with the images of a glove on one and a rose on the other.

"Five? How can there be five slots? There are only four keys." Avenant looked up at the rippling skin of the ship.

Fear welled up in his heart, but he had to try. He had to get inside the ship; she was the only one who could make the pain in his head stop. She was the only one who could repair the split in his mind.

With shaking fingers, Avenant slid the four keys into the key pad. He offered up a prayer to gods he no longer believed in and waited. Nothing happened.

"No! Please! Diana! Please!!!"

He pulled the crystals off the pad and replaced them, pressing them deeply into the pad until his hands hurt with the effort. Still the Diana remained sealed.

Smashing the crystals to the ground, Avenant cursed in several languages, three from earth and two others half-remembered from his childhood in the stars. He fell to his knees before the Diana and cried, banging his fists against her shimmering hull and begging for release.

 

Chapter Twenty-Two

 

Jack pulled his ear piece off and slammed it on the desk.

"Damn it!"

Knowing that Avenant had taken the crystals out from under their noses galled him. That the man had used his Toshiko to find the damn things in the first place made him even angrier. At least the man had had the sense not to kill anyone while he was breaking out of the base. That would have put him on Jack's permanent hit list with no hope of getting off.

"Anything, Tosh?" Jack paced over to her station to look over her shoulder.

"Confirming four signals; he has them with him," Tosh said, looking up from the computer.

"And we have the fifth one."

Tosh nodded.

"So now what, Jack?" Gwen asked.

Jack looked at Gwen and then to Owen, who was standing next to her. They were all as sick of sitting around gathering data as he was. It was time for some running. Jack grinned, and he knew it was the smile of a wolf, hungry and determined. "Now we go after Avenant and get the other four back."

"And help Beast," Ianto said from where he stood leaning against the door jamb.

Owen looked over his shoulder and sighed with good-natured exasperation. "You should be in bed."

"I'll live." Ianto gave a half-shrug and smiled, almost like his old self. "Like you said, no one's ever died from embarrassment."

Jack put a hand on Owen's arm and shook his head ever so slightly at the doctor. Owen sighed again and nodded. Jack looked over to Gwen.

"Go requisition us an SUV and get it ready. We'll meet you out front in fifteen."

Gwen grinned. "Does this mean I get to drive?"

"Depends on how good you are at requisitioning," Jack answered with a wink and a wicked smirk.

Gwen humpfed good-naturedly then grabbed her gun from the lock-box in her desk and headed toward the motor pool.

"Tosh, figure out what you'll need to get the ship working once we get the crystals from Avenant. Owen, bring whatever you can that might help Beast."

"And me, sir?" Ianto asked with a tired smile.

"Well… you can start with holding up that wall."

"I think I can manage that."

"Good," Jack said, walking over and putting his arms around Ianto's waist. "You know Beast the best of all of us."

Ianto nodded.

"So you're on point with him. Keep him talking. Get him to tell you everything he knows about that ship and how it works. If there are codes we need, or sequences to how the keys work - anything that's going to help Tosh get it working."

"And if he's too ill to speak?"

"Leave that to Owen."

"Right."

Jack opened him mouth to say something, then closed it again, knowing Ianto wouldn't take kindly to his thoughts.

"What?"

Jack shook his head. "A momentary desire to wrap you in cotton batting and lock you in the medical bay."

"Oh, really?"

"It passed."

"I should hope so. Imagine what Tosh would do if you tried that with her."

Jack winced.

"And we both know Tosh could take you in fight." Jack started to dispute this but Ianto continued over his protests. "Now imagine what I will do to you if you pull that shit with me."

"Oh," Jack said with a patently false quiver in his voice. "I see your point."

"Good. Now help me to damn car before I fall over, sir."

Jack lifted Ianto's arm up on to his shoulder and hugged him close to his body so that he could take most of the other man's weight. With Ianto grumbling quietly under his breath about the ridiculousness of being more tired than a newborn babe, they made it to the parking lot and got Ianto settled into the SUV in less time than it took the others to get their supplies ready, so no one but Jack saw Ianto startle awake from a doze as the car doors slammed shut.

 

Chapter Twenty-Three

 

"Ianto, slow down!" Jack called out, but Ianto couldn't wait. He needed to see Beast. He needed to know that they were not too late.

Though it took more effort than he cared to dwell on, Ianto sprinted up the last steps of the spiraling south tower stairs. His breath came in ragged gasps, but he pushed past his body's exhaustion and ran the short distance to the bedroom where he'd last seen Beast. Jack and Owen were right behind him. He could hear the higher pitch of Gwen and Tosh's boot heels on the stairs following them.

He pushed open the doors to the bedroom and did a quick scan. Nothing. He moved farther into the room and saw the doors to the balcony standing open, one iridescent clawed hand lying on the floor against the glass paneling.

"Beast!"

The dark, patchy head turned slowly as Ianto stumbled to a halt beside him.

"The peacock has gone silent," Beast said, trying to raise his head. "The devil has devoured him from the inside out."

Beast eyes were clouded over, the yellow irises bleached out to gray with cataracts. His mouth was crusted with blood and most of his whiskers were broken or missing. Ianto ran his hands along Beast's face, hoping to reassure him that he had come back, only to pull back in horror as his fingers came away with mats of scale-encrusted fur.

"Beast…"

"Everything is fading. I could see the barrier with its crackling lights. It was beautiful. I stood here and watched it for an hour or more. The peacock called out to his hen in the lightning. Now they are all gone.…" He brought his hand up in front of his eyes. "I can barely see my own hand."

Ianto raised Beast's hand to his chest and held it tightly. "Beast, it's me…it's Ianto."

"Ianto…" he turned his head, tracking the sound of Ianto's voice. "You came back."

"Yes."

"Did you save your Jack?"

Ianto looked back over his shoulder to where Jack stood watching them. "I did, thanks to you."

"I am glad."

Jack knelt down and took one of Beast's hands in his own, squeezing it gently. "Hello, Beast. Thank you for sending Ianto back to me."

Beast tried to smile but was overtaken by a storm of coughing that shook his body from head to foot. Owen pushed past Jack to kneel on Beast's other side.

"Hold him still!" Owen ordered.

Ianto and Jack grabbed Beast's arms and held him through the coughing, doing their best to keep him from thrashing around and hurting himself or them. When he could speak again, Beast turned his head toward Owen.

"You are the doctor Ianto told me of?"

"Owen Harper. Lie back now while I check you over."

"It is too late for that."

"I'll be the judge of that," Owen said, running his scanner over Beast. "Right. I can give you something for the pain. It should also slow the course of the reaction and give us time to sort you out properly."

"Nothing will stop what is coming for me. All that's left is pain."

"I've seen you face pain, Beast. You've coped with isolation for too long to give up now. I know you have more courage and strength than this," Ianto said in desperation.

Jack nodded. "Do it."

Owen pulled a syringe out of his kit and slid its needle into a bottle of clear liquid.

"Ianto, if I were a man ... doubtless I would ... be and act as you say ... but poor beasts only know ... how to lie on the ground ... and die."

Owen inserted the needle into Beast's arm and depressed the plunger. Beast, staring sightlessly up at Ianto, shivered once and passed out.

"No!" Ianto cried. He reached for Beast's face but Owen stopped him.

"He's not dead, mate, just unconscious. Let's get him onto the bed."

Ianto and Owen lifted Beast and, with help from Jack, got him settled gently onto the bed.

Owen glanced over at Jack. "That shot won't hold for long. We have to get those crystals back into whatever configuration they belong and we have to do it soon."

"Right. Tosh and Gwen, you're with me." Jack pointed at each of the women in turn and walked toward the door.

"Jack, wait…." Jack turned back to Ianto. "Beast's ship, the Diana, is in the center of the garden out back." Ianto indicated the balcony windows. "Since that's what Avenant wants…"

"That's where he'll head first. Got it."

"Good luck."

"You too." Jack turned in a swirl of dark blue wool to follow Gwen and Tosh into the hallway.

 

Chapter Twenty-four

 

Avenant stood outside the Diana, the Horse Crystal in one hand, the Glove Crystal in the other. Tears streamed down his face. A faint violet glow emanated from the Glove crystal.

"Let me in, damn you!"

He pushed a button on the Glove crystal and closed his eyes. The crystal began to glow more intensely but Avenant remained where he was.

"Please! I just need to get inside," he begged the ship in a flood of tears. "Please!" he sobbed and then threw the crystal at the ship wall, where it bounced and slid to the ground.

Avenant stood sobbing for a moment and then pointed the Horse crystal at the ship. "I didn't want to do this…"

Pushing a button on the side of the crystal, he aimed and fired it at the ship's hull. A bright beam of light pierced the darkness and bore into hull plating. Avenant ran forward, only to watch as light and liquid fiber poured into the hole, filling it and closing it in an instant.

"No!" he shouted, shivering in the warm air.

He fired again and again. Chills crawled up his arms and spread to his chest, making it hard to breath. Each time he fired, holes appeared in the ship's hull and were healed over moments later. Avenant pushed the button to fire again but nothing happened; the cube stayed dark. Cold sapped his strength. His teeth clattered like bones in his mouth and tremors rippled uncontrollably through his limbs. His hands shaking with cold, he dropped the cube.

"There has to be a way," he mumbled, stumbling away from the ship. "There has to be!"

He shoved his ice-cold fingers in his pockets and turned back towards the ship. His knuckles collided with the hard edges of the other crystals. "Of course!"

He pulled the crystals from his pocket, sorted the Mirror from the other two, and held it aloft towards the Diana. He pressed the button and the pale yellow viewscreen shimmered to life in the air between him and the ship.

"How do I get in?"

Avenant glared at the image screen, willing it to show him what he needed. Slowly an image formed: five crystal cubes sliding into place in the slots of the keypad of the Diana's hull.

"I know that!" he shouted, his breath growing ragged as the crystal drew power from his lungs. "What's the other crystal?!"

A second image appeared in the Mirror's viewing area, this time of a single crystal cube with a rose carved into its glowing surface.

"A rose? A damn Rose is one of the crystals?" He took another deep breath and tried to focus his thoughts back on the Mirror crystal.

"Where is the Rose crystal?" He staggered as air hissed from his lungs. His vision grayed out and then refocused as he gulped air.

The image shifted again to show Jack running through a long hallway lined with candelabra held by a moving golden arm, his long coat nearly gold in the pale light of the crystal's screen. In front of him were Tosh and Gwen, who slowed down as the hallway ended. The three leaned out into the room in front of them, shook their heads, and then turned to the right, following Tosh into the kitchen.

"Damn meddling Torchwood," Avenant muttered, knowing full well that there was a door from the kitchen to the garden. He'd snuck through it on more than one occasion as a child, before he'd run from the nightmare memories of the castle.

He shoved the Mirror back into his pocket and leaned over, trying to catch his breath through the shaking of his muscles. He was frantic for sleep and warmth, but there was no time for either. He needed to go home. He needed to be safe. And now Torchwood was on his heels.

"Avenant!" Jack yelled, barreling into the garden with Gwen and Tosh right behind him.

Avenant grabbed the Horse from the grass between his feet and stood up. He backed up against the side of the Diana facing Jack and the women and pushed the button on the crystal. This time a weak bolt of light shot out from the cube to burn the earth in front of Jack's feet. Avenant shivered.

"Stop where you are!"

Jack slid to a stop, holding his arms out to block Tosh and Gwen from moving forward as well.

"Whoa! Hang on a minute. We just wanna talk."

"Give me the Rose!" Avenant shouted. His head was pounding. Voices were calling to him but he couldn't make out their words. He looked over his shoulder; there was a shadow there reaching out towards him. "Mother?" he whispered.

"Not going to happen," Jack said.

Avenant swung his aching head back to Jack. The Captain was looking at him oddly. He looked back into the shadows. The image was gone. Had she ever been there?

"Avenant?"

The voices were finally forming words. Give it to us! Give it to us and we'll stop hurting her, they sneered. Avenant shouted to drown them out. "Give me the crystal!"

"I can't do that."

Give it to us! The voices droned on. Do you like seeing her in pain? You must. You are doing this to her. You are causing her pain.

Shadows stepped away from the trees, stalking towards him. Villains with fangs for teeth and hate for hearts reached for him, laughing as he dodged. His mother reached for him with her arms out to him, her empty eyes sloughing around, seeking him.

"Mother…" Avenant reached out to the shadow. His hand passed through air and he cried out. "No! Nonono…." He looked at Jack, and he knew that the other man was confused, but he couldn't explain. He needed to follow the rules and help his mother. "Please, I need the Rose crystal!" Avenant cried.

"Why, Avenant?" Gwen asked. "Why do you need it?"

"It's been too long," Avenant said, tears spilling down his cheeks. "So long."

"So long since what?"

"This ground is too far away, and cold." The shadows circled him, daring him to tell them the truth, tell them about the woman screaming in his head as she died. "The stars are home. Run far enough, fast enough and the stars will sing you to sleep."

"We can help you," Gwen said.

"No! You can't help." Avenant turned the Horse crystal on Gwen, the shadows pressing in on him. Get it for us, child. Get us what we need and we'll stop. "I know all about Torchwood. 'If it's alien, it's ours' - that's what you do. You take everything that is alien. You take and you keep. You don't help."

"That was the old Torchwood," Gwen said, stretching her hand out toward him. It passed seamlessly through a demon with a leering grin. "Torchwood One. Torchwood London."

"You're all the same," he cried, pressing his hands to his head.

"We're not them," Jack said.

"Avenant, please… listen to Jack," Tosh begged, stepping around Jack.

"He's the worst of the lot!"

Tosh smiled at him gently. "He's not. Jack's different. He's the best of us all. I told you that when we talked in all those emails. Remember?"

"Tosh?" Avenant took a step toward Toshiko. Her voice cut through the noise in his head like a soft breeze.

"Yes, it's me, Toshiko."

"I remember talking to you. You were so kind to me."

Tosh took another step toward Avenant. The shadows receded in her wake. "I'm glad you think so. I enjoyed our talks."

"It's so loud, Toshiko. So loud and cruel. They keep hurting her and taunting me. It won't stop. I just want it all to stop."

Tosh looked over her shoulder at Jack. Jack motioned her to keep going.

"I know. Will you trust me to help you?"

"I'm so cold, Tosh. So cold and tired."

"I know… I know. Will you let me help?"

Avenant took a step toward Toshiko and collapsed at her feet.

"Oh god, he's ice cold!" Tosh cried.

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and cradled his shivering body. He felt warmth spread through him as Gwen knelt beside them, her gentle hand rubbing small circles along his back. Avenant tilted his head as Jack stepped into place beside them. Beyond the Captain, the shadows were cowering in the trees, still reaching for Avenant but unable to touch him. He breathed a sigh of relief and balled his hands in Tosh's jacket.

"That must be the side effect of the Horse crystal," Gwen said. She took the crystal from Avenant's unresisting hand and offered it to Jack. "And his breathing is nearly as bad as yours was, Jack. I'd say he tried every crystal he had to get into the ship."

"I think you're right. It drained him dry," Jack agreed. "We need to find the rest of the crystals."

Tosh stroked Avenant's arm and stopped to pat the surface of his jacket. "There's something here."

Jack reached into the pocket and pulled out the Key and Mirror crystals. "That's three. The other one has to be around here somewhere."

Gwen and Jack stood up. Through his haze, Avenant could hear them pacing through the grass around the Diana, looking for the final crystal. He tried to lift his head and point to where he'd seen the crystal fall when he'd thrown it, but he was so tired and finally safe, wrapped in Toshiko's arms.

At last, Gwen shouted from near the ship's hull. "Here!"

"Right, that's all of them." Jack turned to the ship. "So, lovely lady, what say you and I have a little talk?"

Jack pointed the Key at the ship and activated the cube. Copper light radiated from the ship's hull as the key panel slid open. "Well, that was easy."

Avenant forced his eyes open so he could watch as Jack placed each cube in its appropriate slot on the pad. A moment later, the ship lit up with a golden light. A panel, as tall as Jack and wide enough for all three of them to stand in, appeared in the side of the ship, and slid inward and then to the side. The Diana was open.

The voices in Avenant's head cheered. At last! Take us in, child! Take us in and we'll stop hurting her. Take us in and we will end all of it! The shadows raced out of the darkness to fill his eyes, his ears and mouth. They drowned him with their laughter. Avenant screamed and clawed at his ears.

"Jack!" Tosh called out, fighting to hold onto Avenant's thrashing form.

"Mother!" Avenant screamed, his throat distending on the extended sound, and then collapsed into oblivion in Tosh's lap.

 

Chapter Twenty-Five

 

Light flared outside the balcony window, a shimmer of gold and green, followed by the pervasive blue. The barrier walls vibrated back into life. Animals called out throughout the garden, startled by the surge of power around them.

"Looks like they did it," Owen said.

"Mm-hmm," Ianto nodded, turning away from the fading glow and back to Beast.

On the bed, Beast surged up, his eyes open and staring towards the ceiling. His breath came in ragged gusts and he shook from side to side. After a moment, the tremors subsided and Beast was left gasping for breath.

"Beast! What is it? What's wrong?"

"Ianto…" Beast wheezed.

"Yes. Can you tell us what's happening to you?"

"I can see home!" Beast reached out to grasp at something beyond Ianto's shoulder. "I can see… but I can't reach it."

Ianto looked at Owen, who shrugged.

"I'm almost home, but I'm here." Beast turned and grabbed Ianto's arms. "Trapped forever. I can see home, but I can never be home. That's the cruelest thing they could have done."

"Who? What did they do to you?"

A shock wave of energy poured over them from the garden, followed by a blast of sound and golden light. Beast reared up again, nearly pushing both Owen and Ianto off the bed as he reached desperately for something outside the bedroom.

"Please! Please…"

A moment later Beast collapsed backward, screaming like his soul was being pulled from his body. When the sound stopped, near-silent words from another world began pouring out of his mouth while his eyes tracked motion that only he could see.

"That blast has to have been them getting into the ship. Shouldn't that have made things better instead of worse?" Ianto asked.

"I don't know," Owen said, pulling equipment from his bag. He ran his scanner through a set of tests and shook his head.

"What?"

"This doesn't make any bloody sense!"

"Owen!"

"The breakdown of his cells has accelerated."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It's almost as though something is tearing him apart on the genetic level."

"How do we stop it?"

Owen shook his head. "I don't know."

"Not good enough!" Ianto leaned his chest on top of Beast to keep the alien from throwing himself off the bed and reached up to tap the comm at his ear. "Jack."

Static crackled along the channel for a moment and then Jack's voice filled Ianto's ears. "We found Avenant and the keys," Jack said. "We've opened the ship."

"We know. Jack, listen… Beast is worse."

"How is that possible?"

"Something is tearing him apart, Jack," Owen said, joining the conversation. "There has to be more going on. It's not just the crystals going missing."

"Damn."

"It started when you opened the ship," Ianto said.

"So he's tied to the ship somehow," Jack surmised.

"Seems that way," Owen added.

"Did he tell you anything about it? How to work the controls or anything?"

Ianto shook his head. "Just that he is trapped here."

"Not if we can get the ship working, he's not."

"I think it's more than that. He kept saying he could see home but he couldn't touch it."

"He could see home but not touch it?"

"That's what he said."

"Huh."

"What are you thinking?" Owen asked.

"Sounds like a Temporal Divider."

"Meaning what?"

Jack sighed, the sound echoing along the comm link. "I'm not sure. They're damn hard to create by mistake and they take a hell of a lot of power to maintain. I've only seen it done once before and it wasn't for a joy ride."

"He said it was it was the cruelest thing that could have been done to him," Ianto said.

"It would be. It's probably the nastiest form of prison cell around. Lock someone in one place and tie their essence to another. They're split in time and space until the lock is released."

"That's horrible!"

"Yeah."

There was a long pause, and then Jack spoke again. "Well, now we know what to look for here in the ship. I think can give Tosh and Gwen enough information to track down the lock. Breaking it is going to be another matter…"

"You're good at locks."

"Yeah." Ianto thought he could hear a tired smile in Jack's voice before the other man continued. "Let me know if Beast tells you anything else."

"Will do," Ianto agreed.

Ianto tapped his earpiece off and looked over at Owen.

"You know," Owen said. "Just once I'd like an alien to come through on holiday. Stay a few days, share a drink, take a couple of photos and go home. No hassles, no plots to kill humanity or each other. Is that so much to ask for?"

"I wouldn't know. I've forgotten what going on holiday feels like."

"Yeah."

Owen looked at the alien shaking on the bed beneath them and growled. He could almost see Beast coming apart at the seams and that made him angry. He was a doctor who dealt with aliens every day. He should be able to figure out how to help Beast, but he was stuck holding him in place so he didn't do himself more damage while others hunted for a solution.

Ianto squeezed Owen's shoulder. Owen looked over at the younger man. He saw the exhaustion that still etched lines around his eyes, but beyond that was determination and a promise that once again they were in this together. Owen nodded and adjusted his hold on Beast's arm.

 

Chapter Twenty-Six

 

Outside the Diana, Jack tapped off his comm. He crouched beside Tosh and brushed a hand across Avenant's forehead. It was clammy. The man was shivering and his skin looked nearly iridescent in the flowing metallic glow of the ship's hull. "How is he?"

Toss shook her head. "Not good."

"We need to get inside and find the base unit for a Temporal Divider."

"A what?" Gwen asked, kneeling on Tosh's other side.

"Something you never want to experience."

"What about Avenant?" Tosh asked, worry in her eyes.

"There's nothing we can do for him at the moment. When Beast is free, Owen can look him over and see what can be done to help him."

Tosh nodded then brushed a lock of hair away from Avenant's eyes and laid him gently on the ground. Jack offered her a hand up.

"So what are we looking for?" Tosh asked, brushing grass off her pants.

"It should look something like a globe split in two along its axis. At least the last one I saw did. It shouldn't be bigger than about…so big." Jack spread his hands about twelve inches apart.

"How do we turn it off when we find it?" Gwen asked.

Jack pursed his lips and shrugged. "One piece at a time. Let's get inside and see what we can find."

Jack led the way through the portal into the Diana's main chamber and stopped in his tracks, a small "oh" escaping through his parted lips. "Hello, beautiful!"

If the ship was pretty on the outside - and Jack certainly loved the sweet curve of her lines - she was magnificent inside. Her interior was all smooth planes and glowing lights that flowed from console to console, along the matte-black floors, and up the copper walls to ripple along the semicircle curve of the room's ceiling.

Jack let his hands glide along the glass-like surface of the console nearest to him, following it around to the midpoint of the room to what might've been a pilot's or navigator's station. He spun the contoured chair around and flopped into it with a barely repressed giggle. Lights glimmered to life on the panel in front of him.

"What is it?" Gwen asked, coming to stand behind him. He looked up and knew he was grinning like a fool and couldn't care less.

"A work of art!"

Gwen laughed. "Really, what's got you grinning?"

Jack swung the chair back around and ran his hands along the console, feeling the smooth panel warm under his fingers. "Beast wasn't kidding when he said the Diana was a living ship. Everything about her is alive. She knew when we walked in; she turned the lights on and activated this console when I sat down. She's a sweet ship, and a rare find. There's not many like her in this time period."

Tosh leaned over Jack's shoulder, her hands ghosting over the markings that blinked into life when Jack's hand passed over them. "So where's she from?"

"A couple of possible places. The Sseliesian Nebula was on the verge of developing technology capable of smart-ships, but I don't think they were quite up to this level of sophistication last time I checked. Could be the Pelleplos; they were well-known for blending cognitive tech with liquid gene bonding."

"So definitely not local," Tosh teased.

"Definitely not."

"Right. I'll start looking for an evil sphere, shall I?" Gwen rolled her eyes. Jack laughed and nodded.

"I'll give you a hand," Tosh said.

Jack held her back with a light touch on her arm. "I need you to see what you can do about getting the Diana ready to fly."

"Wouldn't you be better at that? I'm mean, you've actually flown a space ship, right?"

Jack shook his head with a grin. "Fighter jock. I just followed the manual. You actually understand how the gears work, and that's way more important right now."

Tosh beamed. "All right, then."

Jack ran his hand longingly across the console once more, then pushed himself out of the chair and held it in place for Tosh to sit down. Once she opened her laptop to link with the ship's interface, he turned to the opposite side of the compartment to hunt for the device.

"So, my girl, what do you need from me?" Tosh mused, and then stopped suddenly. "Oh! Um… Jack…"

He strode back to her side. "Yeah?"

"You keep saying that this is a living ship…"

"Yep. Why?"

"She just answered my question with a question."

Jack peered over her shoulder and read the words blinking on the computer screen.

"'Who are you?' The ship is asking who we are!"

"Well, I didn't type that," Tosh insisted.

"Huh."

"What do I say?"

"We're inside her. I, for one, would tell her the truth."

"Right." Tosh typed a few lines into her computer. "My name is Toshiko Sato. I work for Torchwood and I am here to help repair you so you can fly again."

"Simple and to the point," Jack said approvingly.

Words appeared on the screen below the prompt icon. Who are the others?

"Observant, isn't she?"

"Is the ship really asking questions?" Gwen asked, joining them.

"It seems so. Any luck?"

"Nothing."

"This is my boss, Captain Jack Harkness, and the other woman is my coworker, Gwen Cooper," Toshiko typed.

You found the keys that Father hid.

"Yes."

That is good.

There was a pause. All three team members looked at each other. Jack knew they were wondering what to do next.

The sons are not well.

"The sons?" Gwen asked. "She means Beast and Avenant, doesn't she?"

Yes.

"You can hear me?"

Yes.

"The sons are both very ill and we would like to help them," Jack said, propping one foot on the edge of the seat and resting his arms on his knee. "Beast and Avenant spoke of needing to see the stars again, to leave this planet. Will getting back aboard you and into space help them?"

Yes. And no. That which fractures them must be destroyed first.

"That which… the Temporal Divider?" Jack asked.

That which fractures and separates them from home and each other, yes.

"We think the device is here inside of you. Can you help us find it?"

No. The Diana paused and Jack couldn't help but wonder if a living ship had emotions as well as sensors. It was shielded before it was placed within my hull. I only know it exists. It broke my path and distorted my vision.

"Someone put the Temporal Divide on board and locked it against you as well?" Tosh asked.

Jack whistled. "I didn't think it was possible to lock a TD to a ship."

Yes. Such a thing is done. It was done to me.

"Jack, I have an idea…" Gwen said. Jack nodded for her to continue. "Diana, is there a place within you that feels wrong?"

Please explain.

"Not like what you remember from before the device was placed. Something that feels...um… different…" Gwen looked to Tosh for help.

The other woman thought for a moment and then added, "Less than optimal."

Yes.

A map appeared within a screen on the console. It showed the layout of the ship. There was a blinking spot in one compartment two levels below where they currently stood.

This spot has been less than optimal for 512.34 earth years.

A moment later, a trail of copper lights spread out along the matte floor panels leading from the chair out of the main cabin.

"That has to be it," Gwen said.

"Good work!" Jack said. "Tosh, you stay here with Diana. Keep an eye on the map and the sensors. Let me know if anything changes as we get close to the device."

"Sure thing."

"Gwen - with me."

Jack jogged out of the cabin, trusting Gwen to follow him. The copper lights continued into the hallway and down a flight of stairs. Lights pushed the darkness away ahead of them, showing tantalizing bits of the ship as they went quickly past. With another flight of stairs, the light trail turned left into a narrow corridor barren of all color and texture.

"Jack…"

"I know."

"It's like the walls are dead."

"They may be. That's the door we're looking for." Jack pushed several buttons on a small panel next to the door but nothing happened. "Diana, the door's locked. Can you open it?"

I have tried, but the controls are no longer within my command structure.

"Tosh?"

"Hang on a sec."

Jack heard her type a few instructions into her keyboard. "It's not working, Jack. I'm locked out of all the commands for that area, just like Diana is."

"Ok. I hate to do this to you, Diana, but we need that door open."

I understand.

Jack nodded to Gwen. They each raised their guns, aimed and fired at the key panel. The door slid open. "Got it!"

Gwen reached into the gaping hole. It looked like a wound with a thick silver substance oozing down the wall towards the floor. Jack had to look away. He tugged Gwen with him into the room.

Inside, they found shelves and tables overflowing with data cubes, boxes of toys, clothing, personal items, household goods, even furniture, and Jack thought he saw a rug rolled up in one corner.

"Ianto would be in heaven in here," Gwen said softly as they looked around the room.

Jack smiled. "We'd lose him for a week while he got everything catalogued to his liking."

Near the back of the room, the Temporal Divide sphere sat on a table surrounded by what looked like a lifetime of personal effects. It was an innocuous-looking object. This one was a little bigger than Jack had expected - closer to a foot and a half in diameter and two feet tall. It looked like a simple piece of abstract art or a science project gone wrong. Three interlocking globes were suspended over a trapezoidal base. Two of the globes had been sliced, not just in half, but into quarters. The third was more like a collection of splinters held in a roughly spherical shape than a true globe. Jack shivered. Nothing about this TD was good. He wanted it unlocked and broken now, and then he wanted to hunt down and hurt the people who had used it on this family.

"Tosh, we found it," Gwen said into her comm unit, then turned to Jack. "Any ideas on how to disable it?"

"Brute force worked on the door lock." Jack clamped down on his anger and pointed his gun at the device.

"Okay," Gwen said, gamely aiming her gun.

Together they pumped continuous rounds into the Temporal Divider. As the shots impacted it, the device started to glow. The light increased until neither of them could look directly at it, though they kept firing. Jack's Webley ran out of bullets. He holstered the gun and pulled his UNIT-issued Glock and kept firing. The light flared around them and burst outward, sending Gwen and Jack flying back into the hall. Smoke and a dust wave of debris followed them.

Jack put a hand to his head; there was a very loud, very bad mariachi band playing in there and he really wanted them to stop. Gwen groaned beside him, flat on her back. She was squeezing her eyes shut, which suggested that the band was playing in her head as well. He took a couple of deep breaths and felt his stomach settle back into place. The band wound down and he heaved himself to his feet without an encore.

"Ugh," Gwen groaned as she sat up.

"I know what you mean. Come on." Jack held out a hand and pulled her to her feet. Together they walked back into the room.

On the table, the Temporal Divider lay blackened and broken into numerous pieces.

"Jack! Gwen!" Tosh's voice came over the comm.

"We're here, Tosh," Gwen answered. "We're okay. We did it. It's shattered."

"I know! Diana can see you in the room. She can access every part of herself again."

Thank you.

"Our pleasure, lovely lady," Jack said.

"Diana?" Gwen asked. "Can you tell how Beast and Avenant - how the sons - are? Has destroying the device helped?"

The sons are still unwell. If you will attend to the son who is outside my hull, without touching him or interfering in the process in any way, I will instruct Toshiko regarding the placement of the power crystals for the optimum health of all family members.

"Got it!" Jack said heading for the stairs at a run.

 

Chapter Twenty-Seven

 

Jack's voice buzzed over the comm unit. "Diana says to keep an eye on Beast, but don't touch him or get in the way of what's coming."

"What the hell does that mean?" Owen demanded.

"Don't argue. Just keep an eye on him, but don't touch him until things stop changing. It should be pretty obvious, given everything else she's done so far." Jack paused. "Are we clear?"

"Yes," Ianto said.

"Owen?"

"Yeah, okay, fine."

"Okay, then hang on."

Moments after Jack disconnected, fingers of light poured into the room from the garden. The rays spread out, blanketing all three of them in a warm golden haze. On the bed, Beast twitched as the light enveloped him. Ianto looked down at his hands, turned them over and back, watching the light paint patterns on his skin, but he felt no effects within himself.

A second set of light rays joined the first, alternating pink and green strands down the walls, along the floor and across each of their bodies. As the tendrils of light reached Beast, his tremors increased.

"Look!" Owen pointed at Beast's arm where dangled off the edge of the bed. Ianto followed the line of Beast's arm to his wrist and saw that the scales were glowing and separating from each other.

"He's changing," Ianto whispered. Owen nodded, entranced.

A third and fourth set of colored lights flowed into the mix. Pale yellow danced with waves of purple and cobalt to blanket Ianto, Owen and Beast in the colors of air and water. As the new colors poured over Beast, his trembling increased until he was thrashing around the bed. Ianto curled his hands into fists, wanting to hold Beast in place and keep him from hurting himself.

All along Beast's body changes were appearing. His sable fur fell in clumps onto the duvet, revealing pearlescent skin beneath. The triangular cat ears vanished into a thick mane of black hair that slowly bleached to something pale enough to capture every color of light shimmering in the room.

Ianto knew that the final crystal had been slipped into place when a brilliant red beam of light blazed across the room. Beast screamed as the fiery light hit his body and fell back onto the bed, his arms thrown out to his side.

Silence filled the room, and it was loud enough to make Ianto realize that there had been a low-level hum throbbing through the air. In the quiet, it felt like the work of transformation was complete. Even the waves of light had stopped moving. It seemed everything, Ianto and Owen included, was waiting for permission to breathe.

Then, as Ianto watched, all the streamers of light moved as one, spilling off the walls and rippling across the floor towards the bed. There, the light wrapped around Beast's body, completely covering him in a rainbow of color. Slowly Beast's light-wrapped form rose up and off the bed. He hung there for a moment, then began to turn, spinning faster and faster until the colors exploded through the room in a nova of white light.

Ianto and Owen hit the floor, arms shielding their eyes.

The blaze of light faded and Ianto braved a look towards the bed. Hovering just over the fur- and scale-littered bed, wrapped in robes of clear light, was Beast. He was beautiful. His skin glowed with an iridescence similar to the scales he had once worn, but now the surface was patterned like waves that rippled smoothly along his limbs. Ianto thought they might still have some of the function of scales, but looked so much more fluid and at one with Beast's body. His eyes, once slitted and yellow, were now pure gold ringed with copper.

The light robes moved, lowering Beast to the floor, then dimmed to nearly nothing in puddles of gold, pink, green, yellow, purple and red light around the bed.

Beast shuddered and sighed. He stared at his hands in wonder, then touched his face. His fingers slid easily across the smooth skin.

"Thank you," Beast said.

Owen grinned. "Don't thank us yet… well, okay; do thank us, but wait till you see what's waiting for you in the garden."

Ianto held out a hand to Beast, who took it with a distracted smile. Then he and Owen helped Beast, who was still unsteady, out of the castle and to the Diana's resting place.

 

Outside the Diana, the others were waiting for them beside a transformed Avenant.

"Brother!" Beast cried when he saw Avenant. "You're alive!"

Avenant nodded, his pale hair shimmering with reflected streaks of copper and gold. His skin, Ianto noted, it was slightly ruddier than Beast's, which appeared to blend into a dark pink. Avenant waved toward Jack, Gwen and Tosh. "Thanks to your friends."

Beast stepped away from Ianto to take his brother's hands in his own. They stood together, hand in hand, eyes closed, foreheads touching for a long moment. Ianto walked around the brothers towards Jack's side. He watched Beast's movements and he saw Beast's breathing stumble and then take up a new rhythm, synced to Avenant's. With a sigh, the brothers opened their eyes, blinked slowly and then turned towards Jack and the team.

"Thank you," he said. "You have returned to me more than I ever dreamed possible."

"You're welcome," Jack said.

Owen raised his scanner and began to check Beast's vitals. "Amazing."

"What?"

"The root cell structure is the same in this form as it was in the other… but this one is stable, whole, and complete. No mix-and-match science project pretending to be a living creature."

"Yes," said Beast.

"So?" Gwen asked. "Do you know what happened?"

Avenant nodded and Ianto saw him squeeze Beast's hand reassuringly. "Those who imprisoned our family were thieves of ships; pirates, you would call them. They wanted to own the Diana, but had no interest in paying us for her, even if we could have given her to them."

"I can understand why. She'd be a prize in any galaxy," Jack said.

Beast nodded. "But Diana is family. We are bound to her as she is bound to us."

"Chromosomal or Rh factor?" Jack asked.

"Chromosomal," Avenant replied. "Supplemented with each generation born into her keeping."

Jack whistled appreciatively. "No way your parents could have sold her with that kind of bond."

"No," Beast said sadly.

"But pirates do not care about such things. They took us and our mother hostage to try to bend Father to their will," Avenant said. "They bound my brother and me within the Temporal Divider three times over several days' time."

"And your mother?" Gwen whispered when both aliens had fallen silent.

They bound the Mother within the device. The Diana continued the tale, her voice projecting from out of the ship and into their minds. Every day, from the time they captured us until the moment we entered the storm, they bound her and released her over and over again. In the end, she neither knew her family nor her own genetic structure.

Ianto fought back a wave of nausea, imagining the hell their mother had suffered. Beside him, Jack looked sick. Tosh and Gwen each sobbed quietly, hands clasped for strength. He looked across the grass where Owen was kneeling, busily digging in his medical bag, his back to all of them. Given the stiffness of his shoulders, Ianto knew he was equally affected by Diana's words.

Avenant ran a hand over Beast's hair, a gesture of comfort and connection. Beast leaned into the touch, his eyes closed, sorrow etched into his features.

"I'm sorry," Jack said at last.

Avenant nodded, settling his arm around his brother's shoulders.

Their father never gave the pirates what they were seeking. He hid the crystals from them and from the sons, and when the opportunity came, instructed me to fly into the storm.

"She saved our lives," Beast said.

"But the damage had been done," Owen said, looking up from his kit.

"Yes. The Temporal Divider was still in place, as you saw, and we were still bound within its grasp, split and pulled apart until you destroyed it and set us free," Avenant said.

"And this is you - who you really are?" Gwen asked, fascination replacing horror.

"Yes," Avenant said. "This is who we really are. This is the form I was born into more than half a millennium ago."

And now that my systems have been released from the device, I can take them back to walk the lands of their people.

"Will you be planet-bound after all these years?" Tosh asked.

Beast and Avenant looked at each other and, after a moment, each shook his head. "No," Avenant answered for them. "We wish to see that world again, but our true home has always been Diana and the stars."

Beast nodded. "Indeed, the stars have called to me each night that I lay trapped within my split form. All I wish for is my brother, Diana and the rest of my life among them."

Jack smiled and nodded. "I'm glad we could help."

"About that, Captain," Beast said, stepping away from his brother.

"Yes?"

"I named you 'thief' not long ago and sentenced you to death."

"I believe I remember something about that, yes."

"And your loyal Ianto took your place instead."

"So I noticed," Jack said, with a mock glare at Ianto.

"I thank you both for your actions and your willingness to help me, even when I held each of you against your will."

"Don't mention it," Jack said.

"Not a problem," Ianto said with a shake of his head.

Beast looked at Jack and Ianto each in turn and thought for a moment. "I ask that you accept the deed to this castle in thanks and as payment for your services."

When the two men began to speak, Beast held up a hand to stop them. "Once we are in the stars, what need will we have for a castle on earth? Consider it Torchwood's home in France. After all, even a heroic organization needs a place to get away from the pressures of the job."

Ianto stood back and watched as the other members of the team looked at Jack pleadingly - not that Owen would ever admit that he pleaded, or even wanted a Torchwood France branch. Jack looked from face to face, his eyes growing wider and wider with each silent request. At last he turned to Ianto, a question in his eyes. Ianto regarded Jack for sixty long seconds, mostly to make him sweat, and then nodded.

Jack sighed. "It will mean more work for you."

Ianto shrugged.

"And more paperwork for me."

Ianto rolled his eyes and walked slowly forward.

"I hate paperwork."

"We know," Ianto said, stopping a handspan from Jack. He reached up to straighten Jack's collar. "It will look good on the taxes."

"We don't pay taxes."

"If we did." Ianto brushed a patch of dust off of Jack's shoulder. "We could use it as a rental property, to offset expenses."

Jack looked at him, aghast, then hung his head and laughed. "Fine! Fine! We'll keep the castle."

The girls cheered.

Ianto leaned in and kissed Jack on the nose. "Thank you," he said with a teasing grin.

Avenant coughed, drawing everyone's attention to himself and Beast. "I must also apologize," he said quietly.

Stepping away from Beast, Avenant approached Tosh and gently took her hand. "Toshiko, I am very sorry for any harm I may have caused you. I truly did not know all that I did, and would not… do not wish to see you harmed."

Tosh stared down at her hand nestled between Avenant's softly glowing iridescent ones.   
"I…" Avenant hesitated, looking to Tosh for her reaction and clearly not knowing how to take her silence. "I did wish to get to know you. I enjoyed our time together. If I could…"

Tosh looked up. Ianto could see a glimmer of moisture in her eyes. "It's all right."

Avenant touched her cheek. "You are crying."

She shook her head but didn't pull away from his touch. "It's fine. I just… don't really know what to say."

A tear slipped down her cheek and Avenant brushed it away with his thumb. "Say that you forgive me?"

Tosh nodded. "I do."

"If I could stay…"

"I know."

"May I…" Avenant looked down at Tosh's clasped hands and back up to her face. "May I kiss you one last time?"

Ianto could feel the stillness in the garden as everyone - even the ship, it seemed - waited for Tosh's answer. Then Avenant's copper-and-gold-speckled head dipped down, his hair falling like a curtain to shield them as he took Tosh's lips with his. Ianto only knew that Tosh was pleased because her slender arms came up around Avenant's waist to hold him close.

 

Epilogue

 

Jack shaded his eyes in the dawn's light to watch as the Diana hovered over the garden. A moment later, she pivoted on her central axis then tipped her nose towards the sky. Her engines flared and, with the afterimage of her flight painting their eyes, she was gone.

"So," Jack said, turning to his team. "Home?"

"What?!" Gwen and Tosh said together.

Jack laughed.

"Do you know how long I have wanted to come to Boudreaux?" Gwen said.

"You promised us a vacation, Jack!" Tosh added.

"I did?" Jack tried, and failed, to look innocent.

"You did." Owen crossed his arms over his chest and stepped closer to Gwen and Tosh.

"Siding with ladies now?"

"I'm not stupid, Jack. And besides, yeah, I could do with a bit of time off m'self. Maybe try out the local wine and cheese, you know."

"Un huh," Jack grinned. "Is that what we're calling the lasses nowadays?"

Owen shrugged. "Whatever works."

Jack looked over at the one who'd helped save his life. "And you, Ianto? What do you want?"

"I believe you promised to show me the sights of Perigueux."

"Did I? Odd how you all seem to remember much more than I do about this fabled trip to the Aquitaine."

"Jack!" Tosh and Gwen both threw mock punches at him.

Jack held up his hands in defeat. "Fine. Go pick rooms in the Castle and I'll settle things with UNIT. Anything but the South Tower!"

Gwen grabbed Tosh's hand. "We know!" Together they started across the garden at a run.

"Two days!" Jack called over his shoulder. "Two days and then we head back. And you all better hope that the Rift behaves itself while you're lounging around spending money."

"Oi! We don't lounge. We recline - like you don't know the difference!" Gwen said with a laugh. She and Tosh ducked through a hedge. Jack could hear them laughing all the way to the castle.

Owen tossed off a wave at Jack, a smug look on his face as he followed behind the ladies.

"Oi! You birds! Wait up!" Owen shouted as he passed the hedge and jogged towards the castle.

Jack heard a snicker beside him and turned to see Ianto, hands stuffed into his pockets, toeing the grass and chuckling. The other man still looked a little worn from their adventures. His borrowed tuxedo was dusty and wrinkled. It was really kind of perfect, in a messy sort of way.

Jack tugged Ianto into his arms. "Show you the sights, huh?"

Ianto twisted in Jack's arms and brushed a phantom leaf off of Jack's shoulder. "I do believe those were your words, sir."

"Mmm." Jack leaned in to kiss Ianto lightly on the lips. "I think I might be starting to remember something about that, now that you mention it."

"I'm glad to hear that, sir," Ianto said, kissing Jack in return, then he dragged his lips along the strong jaw to suck at Jack's ear. "Anything I can do to jog your memory?"

Jack moaned. "Oh, I can think of a few things."

Jack captured Ianto's lips, needing to kiss him again. He pulled the other man's head toward him with one hand and pressed their bodies tightly together with the other. When they came up for air, Ianto laughed and stepped away from Jack, taking him by the hand.

Walking past the hedges that led up to the castle, a single deep pink rose with a midnight black center and emerald green leaves fell to the ground at their feet. Jack reached down and picked up the flower. He brought it to his nose and inhaled.

"Mmmm, lovely."

"Jack…"

Jack turned to Ianto.

"That shouldn't be here."

"I know."

"That's Beast's rose… the gallica decur."

"I know."

"It should have…" Ianto looked around the garden. There were no other Rosa gallica decurs anywhere in sight. "They all vanished with the Diana."

"Ianto… I know." Jack smiled softly and offered Ianto the rose with a flourish. Ianto rolled his eyes, but took the proffered flower with a quiet smile.

 

_Once upon a time, a leader of heroes and his trusted partner walked hand in hand through the stone archway of a castle that had been missing for five hundred years. Together they, and their intrepid team, had freed the princes and returned to them a family fortune. That the princes were aliens and the fortune a space ship would never be told in any public history book, but that is the way of things in such tales. And here our story ends, with the fragrance of wonder and beauty on the breeze, a rose and love in hand, and the lights of an alien spaceship streaking across the skies… until the next time childhood's fantasy calls us to the stars and magic beckons us to believe in the impossible._

 

The End

**Author's Note:**

> A PDF of this story and two supporting docs can be found here: http://sacred-seeds.net/?page_id=1405


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